A gaunt lich casts cloudkill, enveloping the area in green, poisonous gas. Five adventurers—a halfling swashbuckler with a rapier, a fighter in Mughal-style chain mail, a sickle-wielding druid in West African–style garb and a head scarf, an aasimar bard-swordswoman wearing a ruqun, and a long-haired elf wizard—struggle forward through the poison gas cloud. The elf wizard is collapsing. A bug in the corner indicates that this blog won a gold ENnie award in 2020.

The Monsters Know What They’re Doing

Ready-to-Use Tactics for D&D 5E

Month: April 2018

  • Phase Spider Tactics

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    I’m puzzled as to why certain creatures are included in the “Miscellaneous” Appendix A of the fifth-edition Monster Manual, which consists mostly—but not entirely—of regular animals, such as apes, bears, crocodiles and so forth. Why, alongside this menagerie of mundane beasts and their oversize cousins, do we also find awakened trees and shrubs, blink dogs, death dogs, wargs (excuse me, “worgs”) and phase spiders? Why didn’t these monsters (none of them is categorized as a “beast”) rate their own listings in the body of the book? So odd.

    Phase spiders differ from giant spiders in a variety of minor respects and two significant ones. First, while they have the Web Walker feature, they don’t spin webs. This struck me as so peculiar that I checked the MM errata to confirm that it wasn’t a mistake. Second, they have the Ethereal Jaunt feature, which lets them phase back and forth between the material plane and the ethereal plane.

    I’m going to take a quick look at its other traits and then come back to these, because I think the phase spider is in need of some flavor text that explains what it’s all about. (more…)

  • Stirge Tactics

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    Stirges are flying, bloodsucking parasites. One alone is a pest, but a flock of them constitutes a threat, and this is how they’ll nearly always be encountered.

    Their Strength is pitiful, but their Dexterity is high. This makes them hit-and-run attackers, or rather hit-and-fly attackers, since they waddle along at a laughable 10 feet per turn but fly at a brisk 40. With a Wisdom of only 8, they’re indiscriminate in their target selection, attacking whoever comes closest to them; and with a barely cognizant Intelligence of 2, they know only one way to attack and stick with it regardless of circumstances.

    This attack revolves around the use of their Blood Drain feature. Starting from a position in the air above its victim, a stirge dives down to bite with its mosquito-like proboscis. If it hits, it latches on. At the start of each subsequent turn, if its victim hasn’t yanked it loose, it automatically drains another 1d4 + 3 hp from him or her. Keep track of this number for each stirge individually, because once it’s drained 10 hp from its prey, a stirge is sated, and it detaches and flies away at normal speed (potentially incurring one or more opportunity attacks as it departs). (more…)

  • Ettin Tactics

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    Today, by reader request, I take a look at ettins, a species of two-headed subgiants distantly related to orcs. There’s not a lot here to look at, though. Ettins are fundamentally a “Rrrraaaahhhh, bash bash bash” monster without any sophistication or subtlety. Clumsy brutes with extraordinary strength, exceptional Constitution and not much Dexterity or Intelligence, they rely on tank-like durability and crushing force to confront enemies head-on.

    The one thing that makes an ettin interesting as an enemy is that it’s difficult to surprise. Thanks to its Wakeful feature, you can never catch an ettin napping: while one of its heads sleeps, the other remains alert. Plus, ettins have expertise in Perception and advantage on Perception checks, along with 60 feet of darkvision. Even in the dead of night, an ettin’s got a good shot at spotting you. For this reason, orcs and other, cleverer beings may employ ettins as sentries. (more…)

  • A Note on Unique Boss Monsters

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    Normally I like fulfilling readers’ requests, but I’ve gotten enough of one particular category of request that I feel like I need to discuss why it’s an exception.

    Several readers now have asked me to analyze the dragon goddess Tiamat or the demon lords in Out of the Abyss, and I regret to say, I’m not going to do that—for a few reasons. (more…)

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