More Dragon Quest 5e Conversions Baramos and Zoma.

[MonsterEnvy]

I was happy with Murdaw so decided to do two more big Dragon Quest villains. Both are from Dragon Quest III Seeds of Salvation. Archfiend Baramos, and Master Archfiend Zoma the Great Demon King.

Zoma I feel is pretty final bossy.

 

[Cleon]

Zoma I feel is pretty final bossy.

Well he's bossier than Murdaw!

Why can Baramos only make a single Melee Attack a round? Wouldn't think "Multiattack. Baramos makes two claw attacks" be more in line with other hefty clawed monsters. At least Zoma has Legendary Actions to claw at more than one opponent in a round.

For that matter, Baramos's illustration shows both his clawed hands limned with supernatural flames, suggesting his claw(s) might do additional energy damage.

The claws don't do very good damage for a CR 19 creature, but presumably he prefers to use his other attacks over that so that won't impact his average carnage per round very much.

 

[Cleon]

I can't help feeling Baramos's Inferno Breath is underwhelming.

A 30-foot cone of 45 (10d8 fire) fire damage (DC 19 for half) is less harmful than the Fire Breath of a Young Red Dragon which covers the same size cone for 56 (16d6) fire damage (DC 17 for half).

Young Reds are CR 10, but Baramos is Challenge 19!

Heck, a CR 6 Young White Dragon can match the 10d8 damage of this "inferno" with its Cold Breath.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

I can't help feeling Baramos's Inferno Breath is underwhelming.

A 30-foot cone of 45 (10d8 fire) fire damage (DC 19 for half) is less harmful than the Fire Breath of a Young Red Dragon which covers the same size cone for 56 (16d6) fire damage (DC 17 for half).

Young Reds are CR 10, but Baramos is Challenge 19!

Heck, a CR 6 Young White Dragon can match the 10d8 damage of this "inferno" with its Cold Breath.

I initially planned for it to be stronger, but it made Baramos CR 20 so I weakened it.

Plus I want all abilities with the same name to be consistent across monsters and Inferno is only the mid tier breath

It goes.

• Fire Breath
• Flame Breath
• Inferno
• Scorch
• Hellfire

 

[Cleon]

I initially planned for it to be stronger, but it made Baramos CR 20 so I weakened it.

So are you using an online CR calculator then? I tend to just eyeball it.

Plus I want all abilities with the same name to be consistent across monsters and Inferno is only the mid tier breath

It goes.

• Fire Breath
• Flame Breath
• Inferno
• Scorch
• Hellfire

Don't most DQ skills scale by level? In which case Baramos would do more damage with Inferno than a lower powered creature.

I had trouble finding any info on how the game calculates breath damage, but eventually found a DragonQuest Tact discussion that indicates its more-or-less fixed by tier.

If so, keeping the damage the same across monsters like you propose makes sense.

Guess the 5E comparison is how spell damage is fixed by slot. So breathing fire with Fire/Flame/Inferno/Scorch/Hellfire might be equivalent to a burning hands cast with a 1st/3rd/5th/7th/9th spell slot).

 

[MonsterEnvy]

So are you using an online CR calculator then? I tend to just eyeball it.

Yeah I am calculating their CR.

 

[Cleon]

Yeah I am calculating their CR.

Suspected as much.

By the way, are you wanting these conversions to appear in General Monster's Completed Fifth Edition Creatures Index or do you prefer them as "off the books" Homebrews?

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Suspected as much.

By the way, are you wanting these conversions to appear in General Monster's Completed Fifth Edition Creatures Index or do you prefer them as "off the books" Homebrews?

If you want to include them feel free.

 

[Cleon]

If you want to include them feel free.

Never mind then, it seems too much like effort!

I can always change my mind later.

 

[Casimir Liber]

Yeah the more the merrier

I think it's great when people import critters from elsewhere that have some sort of established lore/background