D&D 5E Get The Vecna Dossier Free At D&D Beyond

WotC is offering a free product which you can claim by signing into D&D Beyond, including Vecna’s 5E statistics.

The dossier includes the stat block plus a half page or so of lore. Vecna's stat block is a CR 26 undead wizard, prior to the fallen paladin (and former bodyguard to the lich) Kas's betrayal. That means he still has his hand and eye, although he is a time traveller and can appear in different worlds and eras.

The archlich Vecna is one of the most iconic villains of Dungeons & Dragons lore. And now you can bear witness to his necromantic magic with the Vecna Dossier! Available at no cost with your D&D Beyond account, this thrilling supplement details the legacy and statistics of the Undying King himself!

This claim unlocks the contents of this promotional supplement for use with D&D Beyond, including the supplement in digital format in the game compendium and in the searchable listings, character builder, encounters, and digital sheet.

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[dave2008]

Uh huh....Until Mr Sorcerer, Mr Wizard, Mr Artificer, and a host of specialized sub-classes attack and penetrate that AC 18 (like butter for even mid level chars), and administers Shocking Grasp, a cantrip....

Or they could be pretty screwed if it is a group with 4 non-magic melee characters like my group. There is such a wide range of what is possible that you can't design a monster for every situation. You can't count on "specialized" subclasses when design a monster. Vecna here covers a lot of what is wrong to other high CR monsters (I mean compare it to the Lich). However, one issue is...

Shocking Grasp:
Lightning springs from your hand to deliver a shock to a creature you try to touch. Make a melee spell attack against the target. You have advantage on the attack roll if the target is wearing armor made of metal. On a hit, the target takes 1d8 lightning damage, and it can't take reactions until the start of its next turn.

So tell me again about how removing LR's for Reactions is such a stunning move?

Yeah, the designers really put a lot of brainpower into this one.....How long did they playtest this?

....it is to easy to stop his reactions. I would have probably given him cantrip immunity at least.

That being said the design is interesting and fun. It has a lot more going for it than some high CR WotC designs.. I would personally change a few things but I could run this RAW and probably seriously threaten my group.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The point was to keep his primary attack abilities in his statblock rather than his spell list. The Spell list stuff is largely for out of combat, support, if he's going easy on the party for some reason, or under certain situations like escaping with Planeshift.

The optimal stuff for Vecna's damage is just to use his non spellcasting abilities, but for older spellcasters the optimal options were hidden with all the other spells.

Not at all the case. At least with the MotM monsters. Most of the out of combat spells are removed from spellcasters anyway.

 

[Thomas Rainsborough]

Vecna is not designed to be a one vs 4. He is designed to have at least 1-2 minions, 3 at the most, who are CR 14-24. Using Vecna by himself is very much tone deaf, because almost every monster in the game without mythic is not going to be able to stand up to 4 level 13 PCs solo.

If Vecna was meant to be a solo monster, he would have mythic and he would also have a free second turn in initiative, likely on 10, and he would have had lair actions or something comparable on initative 20. Since he doesn't, we can resumably assume he is meant to be fought with some friends.

From this perspective, Vecna is sublime. His globe of invulnerability allows him to teleport around and use his recharge and necro-fear-fireball without getting hurt, while his minions take up the party's attention. He rains down death from above, and sometimes going in to stab someone with his dagger and teleporting away and rainging down more of the above.

That's just one strategy of many with him. And the moment he or his minions drop a PC to 0, he can prevent resurrection by resurrecting them himself. He is a crazy strong Leader, and if I have him do some crazy plot where he gets a Ancient Shadow Fire Dragon, a Demon Lord, and a nightwalker, he will be giving high level players a run for their money.

The fact that a CR 26 needs minions and lair actions speaks volumes on design issues, and design philosophy. And if he is low in the Initiative chain, he dies. No CR 26 should have to need to be win Initiative to survive.

 

[dave2008]

See my post re: Shocking Grasp that totally shuts down the Reactions of Vecna. No save possible. So suddenly Vecna is not hopping around, and is toast. And that is one way I came up with in a few minutes. How many other features/spells/feats take away reactions, without a save?

He can counterspell it though. It autofails because it is a cantrip and he deals 10 damage the caster.

 

[Shardstone]

The fact that a CR 26 needs minions and lair actions speaks volumes on design issues, and design philosophy. And if he is low in the Initiative chain, he dies. No CR 26 should have to need to be win Initiative to survive.

I think you have a different view of CR then WotC does for high level encounters.

4 PCs are very powerful due to action economy and the stacking of an absurd amount of features between them. T3 characters, that is, characters 11-16, can with take on a creature almost anywhere in the range of 21-30 when they are fresh/rested and have their magic items. This is normally mitigated by running games where direct, isolated combats aren't common, such as games where the enemies actually run away and don't fight to the death, and use their own resources to ambush, weaken, and harass the party.

Imagine, someone as smart as Vecna is never going to go into a fight even with no preparation before hand against someone who can cast 5th-9th level spells, attack 3-8 times a turn, bring back the dead, use any of hundreds of different spells at any point during the combat, and so on. Why would he do that? Instead, Vecna gathers together his forces, sets up the battlefield how he wants to set it up, and forces the players into his own game. Its only sensible.

If you want to run Vecna as a solo battle in an arena, that's fine, but high level D&D is not that kind of game unless you give a monster all the things I mentioned in my last post. And its ok that most high level challenges are team efforts, because high level play has a lot of powerful things flying around and, when ran right, becomes a chain of fun and insane encounters that really brings the most out of the 5Th edition system.

 

[dave2008]

The fact that a CR 26 needs minions and lair actions speaks volumes on design issues, and design philosophy.

Not design issues, but definitely design philosophy and assumptions by players. For some reason you assume a CR 26 should be invincible, but that is not what CR26 is in 5e. You need to adjust your perspective of what CR 26 is or you will always have an issue. I know because I used to be like you. I spent a lot of time changing CR calculations and trying to make them the "correct" challenge for the number. Then I realized it is just a number, it doesn't have greater meaning than that.

And if he is low in the Initiative chain, he dies. No CR 26 should have to need to be win Initiative to survive.

I do agree with you here and that is an issue since it doesn't have legendary actions. However, it is designed with quite a bit of methods to get around that. Of course Lair Actions help a lot.

 

[Thomas Rainsborough]

He can counterspell it though. It autofails because it is a cantrip and he deals 10 damage the caster.

Uh huh...and The Sorcerer Quickens Shocking Grasp. Vecna is going nowhere, and is toast.

 

[Stoutstien]

Not bad for a pre god version. Giving him his preferred pick of minor/major features on his book of darkness and you could crank him up.

Uh huh....Until Mr Sorcerer, Mr Wizard, Mr Artificer, and a host of specialized sub-classes attack and penetrate that AC 18 (like butter for even mid level chars), and administers Shocking Grasp, a cantrip....

Shocking Grasp:
Lightning springs from your hand to deliver a shock to a creature you try to touch. Make a melee spell attack against the target. You have advantage on the attack roll if the target is wearing armor made of metal. On a hit, the target takes 1d8 lightning damage, and it can't take reactions until the start of its next turn.

So tell me again about how removing LR's for Reactions is such a stunning move?

Yeah, the designers really put a lot of brainpower into this one.....How long did they playtest this?

Good thing he has a uncounterable CS on tap that also punishes the target. I'd be hard pressed to see this working.

 

[Erdric Dragin]

So it's truly official:

Spellcasting monsters are trash. No thanks to the "even-more-simplified aka watered down" D&D rules for them.

Pretty sure Vecna has way more spells at his disposal than that.

Bring back the old spellcasting blocks, where we had each spell level and spell slots. What the heck is going on with this game and their designers?

 

[dave2008]

Uh huh...and The Sorcerer Quickens Shocking Grasp. Vecna is going nowhere, and is toast.

Why do you assume there is a sorcerer? My party doesn't have a sorcerer.

Also, as I am not familiar, how does quicken prevent shocking grasp from being able to be counter spelled. I thought it just made the spell cast as a bonus action.