How to flavor your monsters into something special...

[FoolishFrost]

You know, the monster manual is a wonderful thing. It gives you, with just one book, limitless options. When combined with the Dungeon Master's guide? It offers even more.

Now, it's easy enough to just pick monsters out of the book and play, but what if you want to give a set of monsters a theme. Perhaps to make a set of villains for your campaign that stand out as creatures your players can recognize instantly.

I now present the monsters I made for my campaign, A set of four creatures called Voidlings.

Void.PDF

Now, look over those monsters, and I'll let you in on a secret...


Go ahead, I can wait...



Oh, back already? All right. The secret is, the creatures started as a Kobold Minion, Kobold Wyrmpriest, and two other monsters for the 5th and 7th level creatures.

It only was the effort of a few minutes to rename some powers already a part of the builds, and a few more to slide new versions of them in for powers already there. Touch of renaming, tweaking, and generally making them work more like some dark life-sucking creatures from beyond, and I'm ready to make my players pay for ever THINKING about being heroes.

If you want more powerful versions of them, just add levels like advised in the DMG. Take a Void Wrath, add some cleric levels dedicated to the Void, and you have Priestess Night. This hedonistic young lady enjoys whipping her cultists and followers into debauched parties in the name of 'Life', and watches with glee as they follower her down a road of perversion that feed her Void masters with not only rage, lust and terror, but also culminate in human sacrifices and willing slaves.

Priestess Night (Void Wraith) Level 10 Lurker (Leader)
Medium aberrant humanoid XP 500

Initiative +14 Senses Perception +14; darkvision
HP 84; Bloodied 42
AC 24; Fortitude 21; Reflex 23; Will 24
Immune disease; poison
Speed 6, fly 6 (hover); phasing
Action Points 1
​

Dire Touch of the Void (at-will; standard) • Void
+13 vs Reflex; 1d8 + 5 void damage, and the target is weakened (save ends); Void wraith heals 5 damage.
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Scream of the Void (encounter; standard) • Void
Close burst 2; +13 vs Fortitude; 2d6 + 5 void damage, and those hit are slowed and dazed(save ends both).
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Endless Void (when reduced to 0 hit points) • Void
Close burst 1; targets enemies; each target is slowed and weakened(save ends both). When slain, a Void Wraith explodes into shards of life-draining void that cripple anyone nearby.
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Void Jump (at-will; move)
The void wraith teleports up to 4 squares, gaining combat advantage against any target that it arrives adjacent to until the end of its next turn.
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Combat Advantage • Void
The void wraith deals an extra 1d6 void damage against any target it has combat advantage against.
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Shell of the Void
Any humanoid killed by a void wraith, instead of being effected by ashen doom, can instead be inhabited by the void wraith. The wraith still has access to all of its powers in its new form, except for phasing. It can also learn new abilites as if a member of the victim's race. This ability alllows a void wraith to act as the perfect spy. When damaged in this shell, they can only be detected by their blood. Their wounds drip Void, not blood. The void wraith can release its body in order to phase if needed, leaving a column of Ashen Doom where it once stood.
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Ashen Doom (at-will; free) • Void
Any time a creature is killed by a Void keyword attack, its body is destroyed and turned to a black-grey column of ash. All non-magical items on the creature are also turned to ash. This does not prevent the creature from being raised from the dead with a ritual, and should be considered a story device rather than a power to permanently destroy characters.
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Healing Word (encounter x2, once per turn; minor) • Healing
Close burst 5; targets one ally in burst; the target spends a healing surge and regains an additional 2d6 hit points.
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Channel Divinity of the Void (encounter; free) • Divine, Void
Summon a Void Wing or Void Walker to do her bidding. She may have a number summoned equal to her Charisma bonus, with Void Wings needing one charisma bonus point, and Void Walkers needing two. She normally has three Void Walkers and three Void Wings already serving her. The Void Wings CAN summon Void Spawnlings.
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Invoke the Void (encounter; standard)
Close burst 10; allies in the burst gain 10 temporary hit points and shift 1 square. After the encounter, all allies lose not only the temporary hit points, but take 10 void damage.
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Void Cleric Powers (encounter x3; standard) • Void
Add 3 encounter cleric powers from the cleric list. Make the powers fit the theme of Void, and change them from time to time for flavor.
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Alignment Chaotic Evil Languages Common, Voidial
Skills Stealth +15, Acrobatics +15, Bluff +14, Diplomacy +14, Intimidate +14, Religion +12
Str 15 (+7) Dex 21 (+10) Wis 18 (+9)
Con 15 (+7) Int 15 (+7) Cha 18 (+9)
Equipment Mace, Chainmail, Adventurer’s Kit

She has an excessive amount of powers really, but you could probably leave out some of the basic Void abilities for void wraiths, and try to keep her secret just a bit longer about what she is.

Either way, you now have enough material for the Heroic tier. Just mix in other creatures to keep it from being "all void, all the time" and you're good!

(post from Foolish Frost's Playground)

 

[Quickleaf]

Nice reflavoring you did there. Personally, I would never make a standard monster with 11 powers - that's elite territory to me, and the complex end of the elite spectrum at that.

 

[weem]

I tend to add a lot of powers to my monsters - even the standard ones.

I'll have the typical 3-5 powers or so, and then I may add another 1-4 or 5 more that are just some cool little things that I think have style that I might break out. I usually put the powers at the bottom of the list and separate with a line when printed - making them optional basically.

EX: I have a group of thieves from a thieves guild who I set up with some powers. Then I think about the fight, and where it will be. Then I start adding in these optional powers that are often times specific to the location...

Just a quick example...

Falling Parts (standard;encounter)
Close Burst 3; +12 vs REF; 2d10 + 5 Damage
The thief shoves a nearby shelf unit, knocking parts down into the effected area.

I like doing these because they are there as a reminder right there with the thieves stat block and tie in nicely (specifically) with that encounter. In another encounter with the same thieves, I would take this power out before printing, or simply cross it off if (for example) they were no where near the shelves.

I guess the short of it is, I dig having a lot of powers to choose from, though I would clarify that as "when I make them".


---edit---

And good post by the way Fool

+XP

 

[DanmarLOK]

I find more powers more fun for both me and the players. But you have to be careful to avoid overly optimizing creatures so that they have abilities that give them both striking and controlling and leadering powers rather than their focused role and attack every defense rather than focusing on a select one or two. Omni-creatures can be not fun for players.

 

[FoolishFrost]

You know, that's a problem I had with this creature: It has it's own abilities, and then, it get's to start taking on levels of a class...

You suddenly have twice the powers.

I guess I could have just made it so it can only use the cleric powers until it 'dies' in human form, then becoming the Void Wraith again with full stats.

Just seemed like more likely for it to use the power a bit while in human form to give hints as to what it is.

 

[Quickleaf]

Yeah, I'm with weem, this is a great thread Fool.

I do a final "compression" check when finishing a homebrew monster, looking for ways to reduce its number of powers by combining multiple effects into single powers or auras.

When I'm running a bunch of bad guys I want to convey the essence of the monster with minimum flipping through power lists. Now, with major elites and solos it's another story. The strigha that Weem and Danmar helped me with has upwards of 11 powers.

 

[Neuroglyph]

When I'm running a bunch of bad guys I want to convey the essence of the monster with minimum flipping through power lists. Now, with major elites and solos it's another story. The strigha that Weem and Danmar helped me with has upwards of 11 powers.

That's a good philosophy... as a DM you want a new monster to be different and diverse, but for the sake of game play you have to keep power lists from getting too overboard or you'll just bog down the speed of play.

But it is darned tempting to rack up an impressive power list just to go toe-to-toe with the PCs...

 

[FoolishFrost]

You know, the more I think of it, the more I think I should Just make Night a PC class while in human shape, and then have her become a Void Wraith when she hit's 0 HP. That makes her a two stage monster, but the question is this: How do you rate the threat of a monster becoming another monster? If she's a level 11 cleric of the Void, and then when she dies she becomes a 7th level Void Wraith, what do you actually have in terms of challenge?

 

[Mesh Hong]

But it is darned tempting to rack up an impressive power list just to go toe-to-toe with the PCs...

My personal creature design rule is that a creatures stat block should not take up more than one sheet of A4 paper when printed out. This makes sure that everything I need is in one place for easier referencing during combat.

This is also one of the reasons I use multiple stage solo creatures as each stage of the creature can be on its own sheet, so that during play I just need to switch sheets at the appropriate time keeping things as simple and easy to read as possible.

One of the problems with having a massive amount of powers is that in the heat of combat you are going to miss some. For example, I have long sinse stopped being surprised to suddenly realise when one of my own creatures dies that it should have had a bloodied reaction that should have been quite effective, sometimes I switch it to an on death reaction, sometimes I just get on with the action.

Its quite embarrassing that just because I can design competent monsters it doesn't mean I can run them competently!

 

[Quickleaf]

That makes her a two stage monster, but the question is this: How do you rate the threat of a monster becoming another monster? If she's a level 11 cleric of the Void, and then when she dies she becomes a 7th level Void Wraith, what do you actually have in terms of challenge?

I'm really interested in this idea of multi-stage monsters. My answer would be go with an elite 11th build with 11th level NPC that turns into 11th level Void Wraith (assuming both your conceptions for the cleric/void wraith are as standard monsters).

This is also one of the reasons I use multiple stage solo creatures as each stage of the creature can be on its own sheet, so that during play I just need to switch sheets at the appropriate time keeping things as simple and easy to read as possible.

Ooo, tell me more about how you run multi-stage solos? What are some examples?

Its quite embarrassing that just because I can design competent monsters it doesn't mean I can run them competently!

Your monsters are great. Personally, I save the full page monsters for major bad guys, maybe two or three of them per tier.