4th level party vs CR5 Catoblepas

[TheCosmicKid]

The Catobelpas was ported from earlier editions, where sudden death was far more common.

It is also based on a mythical creature, described by Pliny the Elder (he who died at Pompeii) that was said to have gaze (or bad breath) that could kill instantly or turn to stone.

It was probably a somewhat garbled account of a wildebeest.

I think it'd be funnier, as well as more accurate to the mythology, if instead of using the generic recharge mechanic it required a (difficult) Strength check to lift its head .

 

[plisnithus8]

I ran it on a session a couple of nights ago after seeing this thread. I had a merchant bring a baby on in dead to sell, but no wanted the smelly meat.
The mother came after it. My party had split up so there were just 3 of them at 6th level. The foolhardy cleric ran up to challenge it and failed miserably against its gaze; dropping his health from 66 to 2 in the first round.
The others joined in, and a 4th player finally showed up and they killed it.

 

[Satyrn]

By the numbers, it's a Medium encounter at best. Maybe Hard if the terrain is working against the PCs and/or for the monster. They should have no problem.

By the numbers, it should be deadly in one way: I'm almost certain that a monster's CR actually measures the level of the "typical" PC that the monster can drop to 0 in one single round if all it hits on every attack and deals average damage.

That's become the only thing I use CR to tell me, anymore.

So if the catoblepas wins initiative and directs all its attacks against one PC, that PC has a good chance to die before ever acting. This suggests my two pieces of advice for the OP to go along with telegraphing its danger: If you want to mitigate your concern, don't roll for initiative and instead just have the PCs go first (which is actually a terrible idea if the catoblepas is alone, since there'll be a strong chance it's dead before it gets to act), or don't focus fire with the catoblepas's strongest attacks on a single PC in the first round of combat.

Go hard after the first round.