D&D 5E Put Some Sword World In Your D&D 2: Multi-Part Monsters

[Iosue]

Are you bored with your D&D monsters being sacks of hit points with multiattacks? Are you looking for a little more tactical variety, but without making your monsters too complex? Storywise, would you like to make your boss monster a challenge without adding a bunch of minion creatures that add to your combat bookkeeping without adding to the story or fun of the boss battle? Then perhaps Sword World 2.5's multi-part monsters are the cure for what ails you!

SW2.5's multi-part monsters are elegant and simple. Each part of the monster acts as its own character. It has an attack bonus, an armor class, saves, and HP, and its own turn in which to act. However, for movement purposes, all parts move as one unit. One part is designated the core; if this part is reduced to 0 HP, then the monster is defeated. The obvious target, then, is the core, but the other parts work to protect this core in various ways.

For example, a giant (or similar Huge humanoid) might have two parts: the Upper Body (its core), and the Lower Body. The Upper Body attacks with the giant's weapon. The Lower Body attacks with kicks. Because of its height, the Upper Body gets a +2 (or more!) to its AC against attacks from the ground. But if the Lower Body is reduced to 0 HP, the giant stumbles to one knee, unable to move, and the Upper Body's AC loses its bonus. The party has a tactical choice: attack the more difficult-to-hit core in an attempt to end the fight quickly, or attack the legs to hobble the giant and make it easier to take out the core.

Let's take an Adult Blue Dragon and make it a multi-part monster.

The Adult Blue Dragon has 225 HP, and AC 19. For attacks, it has a Bite, a Claw, a Tail, and a Breath Weapon. It also has a Wing Attack in its Legendary Actions, but we're going to take the Wing Attack out of Legendary Actions, and make it a regular attack of the Wings part. Because the dragon will get progressively weaker as it loses parts, we're going to buff its HP a bit (this will make it a little stronger than the standard Adult Blue Dragon. Keeping the original HP and simply distributing them to the different parts is also doable.)

The dragon's core is going to be its Head. The Head has the Bite attack, and can also use the Breath Weapon. It gets 150 HP. While the dragon's Forearms are functional, the head gets a plus +4 to AC, giving it a 23. If the Head is destroyed, the dragon is dead.

The dragon has two Forearms, each with 50 HP, and AC 19. Each has a Claw attack. If a forearm is destroyed, the dragon loses a Claw attack. If both forearms are destroyed, the Head loses its AC bonus.

The dragon has Wings, with 50 HP and AC 19. They make a Wing attack, and also give the dragon its flight speed. As part of its Wing attack, the dragon can hover as high as 40 ft, but also as low as 5 ft, giving it reach for all its attacks. When flying, each part gets an additional +2 AC. If the Wings are destroyed, the dragon can no longer fly.

Finally, the dragon has a Tail, with 50 HP, AC 19, and a Tail attack. If the Tail is destroyed, the dragon loses its Tail attack.

Each time the dragon loses a body part, its Frightful Presence Save DC goes down by 1. The dragon as a whole retains its 3/Day Legendary Resistance, which can be used for any part. A dragon can only use its 3 Legendary Actions to Detect, unless only the Head remains, after which, in its fury to survive, the dragon can use any remaining Legendary Actions to Bite or use its Breath Weapon (if recharged).

With an initial 5 attacks on its turn, the dragon will hit hard in the early rounds. But if the PCs can weather the storm, it will get progressively easier. There is a natural narrative flow to the battle: smaller victories that lead to the final one.

The above dragon is a rather extreme case, with its five parts, but even lower level sub-boss enemies like the bugbear chief, or really anything that has multiattack or legendary actions can benefit from splitting these into two or more parts. Just remember that one or more of those parts will protect the core in some way, either by providing a constant bonus to AC, or using reactions to soak attacks meant for the core.

 

[overgeeked]

Sword World is such a great game. Thanks for doing these posts.

 

[mr_monkius]

Do you have to increase the hit points for each of the parts since spells like Fireball can hit multiple parts at once? Does each part need to make its own save?

 

[Tonguez]

I've been doing something similar for a while now, splitting Kaiju in to Zones with their own HP and AC. I actually took the idea from statting Ships and from video game ideas. Anyway I tend to use standard Zones of Legs - Torso/Back - Forelimbs - Head - Wings (when relevant), Tails and other parts when they are significant too. Didnt have the idea of a formal Core but just set the head as the kill zone and that the head was inaccessible unless the PC managed to bypass the legs and torso first - Kaiju generally want to protect their heads.

Anyway my stats for

KING KONG
Gargantuan Kaiju Ape
Str +10 Dex +4 Con +10 Int +1 Wis +3 Cha 0
Spd 40 Climb 40 PP 20
Legendary Resistance (3/day), Seige Monster

Defensive Stance: King Kong instinctively raises his arms to shield his head and torso. As a reaction to a ranged attack to his head or torso, he will deflect the attack causing a hit to his arm instead.

Legs AC: 16 HP: 150 DC: 18 (to Climb/Bypass)

• Stomp: King Kong stomps the ground, causing 2d10 bludgeoning damage to all creatures within a 10-foot radius.
• Knockback: On a successful hit, targets must succeed on a DC 18 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone, on a success the target is pushed back 10 feet.

Torso AC: 18 HP: 200 DC: 20 (find weakpoints)

• Hardened Hide: Reduces all damage taken to his torso or arms by 10 unless the attacker finds a weakpoint.
• Regeneration: Kong regains 10 HP at the start of each of his turns unless the torso is reduced to 0 HP.

Arms/Weapons AC: 17 HP: 150

• Smash (15ft): King Kong can make a powerful attack with his arms and fists dealing 3d10 bludgeoning damage.
• Grab (15t): On a successful hit, targets must succeed on a DC 20 Strength save or be grappled
• Thow: King Kong can throw a grabbed object or creature 60ft causing 6d10 damage

Head AC 20 HP 200

• Roar: All creatures within 30 feet must succeed on a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw or be frightened until the end of their next turn.
• Bite: Deals 4d10 piercing damage.

Legendary Attacks:
Stomp attack
Roar attack
Earthquake Slam: King Kong slams the full weight of his torso and arms onto the ground, causing a massive earthquake. All creatures and structures within a 60-foot radius of King Kong must make a DC 20 Strength saving throw or take 10d10 damage and be knocked prone. The ground in the affected area becomes difficult terrain. On a successful save a Creature only takes half damage and are not knocked prone.
Vunerability: Earthquake Slam makes Kong vulnerable, his head is exposed when he brings it close to the ground and he is unable to use his arms for Defensive stance or grab or throw attacks until the start of his next turn.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

What do you see as the benefit of adding these sorts of dramatic changes to D&D rather than just playing Sword World?

 

[I'm A Banana]

It's a neat idea, but I'm not too interested in a fight that gets easier as it goes on. From a gameplay perspective, there's a point at which you're (almost literally!) beating a dead horse. Where victory is all but assured, but you have to grind through the critter's last few parts just to make it so. Narratively, I'd expect a fight to get HARDER as it goes on and the characters get more desperate and break out bigger and bigger guns.

 

[Iosue]

Do you have to increase the hit points for each of the parts since spells like Fireball can hit multiple parts at once? Does each part need to make its own save?

No, an AOE that targeted the entire monster would be saved against once by the monster as a whole.

The increase in HP is only to forestall a cascade effect. Because eliminating a part also eliminates an attack (and possibly a defensive bonus), at certain point the math turns inevitably against the monster. That's by design, but if the HP are too low, it happens too quickly, I think.

Monster HP in 5e are set with the assumption that the monster will retain all of its attacks to the end. If you start removing attacks as the battle progresses, the monster is no longer providing the challenge intended.

 

[Iosue]

What do you see as the benefit of adding these sorts of dramatic changes to D&D rather than just playing Sword World?

I don't see any dramatic changes to D&D that would justify a wholesale switch. These are just alternative implementations to spice up one's game.

 

[Iosue]

It's a neat idea, but I'm not too interested in a fight that gets easier as it goes on. From a gameplay perspective, there's a point at which you're (almost literally!) beating a dead horse. Where victory is all but assured, but you have to grind through the critter's last few parts just to make it so. Narratively, I'd expect a fight to get HARDER as it goes on and the characters get more desperate and break out bigger and bigger guns.

Certainly a fair consideration!

In my XP, against a powerful foe, my players tend to bring out their big guns early. This whittles down the monster's HP by quite a bit, but the back half of the battle ends up a little sloggy as the party plinks off HP with their melee attacks and at-will spells, hoping their remaining HP and healing will hold out long enough to finish the job. The end is rather anti-climatic, as the monster is firing away on all cylinders, and then...is just dead.

What I like about this implementation is that the players need to consider how to weather the early barrage, and whether to use their big guns to try and take out one or more parts early, or to save those for later against the higher HP core. But also, as a DM, I like that there's a narrative throughline to the combat that can indicate to me when a monster might consider making a break for it. With the standard monster, I eventually get to this choice--well, it's likely that they will beat this monster, but perhaps I can still drop a character--that incentivizes keeping the battle going to the bitter end. But with this, there gets to a point where I can say, "Okay, the dragon sees that he's getting the worst of it, and might actually die, so he's making a run for it." And there's an actual story reason for it. "You've injured the bugbear chieftain's weapon arm, so now he's looking to retreat."

That said, you can very easily reverse this implementation to get that, "fight gets harder as it goes on," feel by having the loss of a part trigger various attack or defense benefits. Lord knows that "more powerful 2nd form" is a very common trope in a lot of media. Basically, the important idea is giving your PCs a little more choice than attacking one thing, and letting their choices create new situations on the battlefield, for good or for ill!