I recently thought of a strange idea for a monster - One that has immunity to magical damage. It would become harder to defeat the higher your level. This doesn't exactly make sense in combat, but how bad of an idea would this really be?
This seems terrible,since spellcasters are completely useless on it (wizard,sorcerer,bard,and warlock are just wrecked,druid,cleric,paladin,and ranger are somewhat reduced in power¨
It wouldn't be very powerful, it would just be to mess with the party. Say they think they have to use their strongest attacks and magic weapons against a blockage but no, it has to be a nonmagical attack.
Maybe have them so their skin appears to be reflective, so that powerful spells end up rebounding upon the party. You could do this with non-magical attacks as well. A 'monster' like this might force the players to role-play and think their way out of the situation, which is a good idea if their characters are becoming mass-murderers. Or if they are 'carrying' a lower level player, that player's attacks or spells might have an effect where the others do not.
If your wizards and sorcerers are getting haughty, you could also try making a home-brew rule that makes certain types of creatures (cats, bears, reptiles etc) resistant to magic, so your fighters and rangers have more of a chance of making an impact.
Well, a lot of high-CR monsters are already pretty much stoked against magic. I mean, all you have to do is give a monster advantage on saving throws against spells, and a couple of daily Legendary Resistances, and you're already rocking something that's gonna frustrate the heck out of your casters. But flat out "immunity" against anything really should have a strong justification. Like, an ancient red dragon is immune to fire damage because - well - duh. Because it's an ancient red dragon. But even Orcus and Demogorgon only have two and one (respectively) damage immunities that aren't just non-magical weapons. And they're both CR 26.
Trust me, advantage on saves OR 3 Legendary Resistances is plenty. Only do both if your party is high level, super overpowered, and you're having a hard time challenging them.
Baldur's Gate 2 had such enemies. You could always tell that you were about to fight them because you'd suddenly find a container full of non-magical weapons.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Really can't say much without the full stats. It sounds way too powerful. It could work, but it would need to be easy to kill, kind of a throw-away encounter.
Sounds like a fun idea. I think you should try it out despite whatever we strangers on the internet says. Spellcasters might not be able to damage it with offensive magic, but they can certainly still support their teammates, and some spellcaster subclasses can certainly go toe to toe against enemies in melee.
You could do some variants of the Rakshasa, have them immune to increasing levels of magic, maybe do it on the basis of immunity to a spell level equal to half the highest spell slot available to the party, so a group with level 4 spell slots would come across "rakshasa" with immunityt to lvl 1 & 2 spells. You've also got the Flail snail as well so you could have creatures with an effect similar to their anti magic shell. Another alternative would be to make creatures that are immune to certain a school(s) of magic so you don't completely nerf spell casters.
Give the spellcasters something else to do. Perhaps the magic-nullifying trait/field is generated by a device that can be deactivated through a skill challenge or there is some other alternative goal that they can work towards.
Most monsters don't "fully" immunize themselves against magic, so there is always a strategy for spellcasters to be effective; A beholder only covers 1/6th of the battlefield with it's eye, a Rakshasa is still vulnerable to magic weaponry and to high level spells, etc.
What I'd do would be a combination of the standard Magical Resistance trait (for save spells) and either the Reflective Carapace trait (for attack spells), or a custom trait that maybe sets a different AC for the creature when they are targeted by spell attacks? (so the creature could be AC 15 normally, but AC 20 for attacks made with spells).
Otherwise, I agree with one of the above posters who said that some environmental effect, other creature, or other goal should be set for casters so they don't feel completely useless.
Using a spell as powerful as that just to make it fall? You make a 10 foot cube vanish from under it. The Move Earth cantrip can make a 5 foot cube so they say. Then you use the same cantrip to bury it.
Without complete stats, we really don't know what the thing is capable of. It's hard to guess what might work, but being immune to magic entirely makes this thing slightly more powerful than the Tarrasque if we don't know it's limitations.
The gremishka from Van Richten's Guide would also somewhat fit the idea of a creature that can cause havok for magic wielding adventurers, especially the gremishka swarm with its limited spell immunity and spell reflection abilities. Wouldn't be terribly hard to increase the spell immunity to handle higher level spells and throw on some sort of damage immunities to "magical" bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing weapons. Would definitely increase the normal CR 2 to something a bit higher, but I wouldn't expect it to become overly powerful with only a +4 attack and 24 hit points... More of a nuisance for even higher level characters than dangerous.
"It might be a large creature" True, but we don't know that, now do we? "Also 5' deep is a ditch, not a pit." Semantics. If you want to be technical, a ditch is assumed to be longer than it is wide. If you fall down into it, a five foot cubical hole in the ground is a very small and shallow pit, and a ten foot cubical hole in the ground is just the same thing, only larger.
"You can complain that you do not get to use your full awesome might" Nope, that's not what I am asking for. "or you can do what you can. Your choice." That I agree with.
I am smiling. There were a couple of threads where I tried to convince people that Move Earth was more like a magical garden rake then a magical backhoe, and I got no traction at all. Everyone else was convinced that since the area of effect of the spell was a 5 food cube they could dig pits, and bury people inside of them.
A lot of people like to try to squeeze out damage from spells that don't say they do and probably were not meant to, but it is always a matter of interpretation, and people like to get everything they can.
If you're doing homebrew kinds of things, you can pretty much do whatever sounds right to you. I don't see how it would be harder to kill the stronger you get, you're still able to pick up a non-magical weapon or just improvise something, with better stats than you'd do it at lower levels.
I had a silly idea for a very weak lobster-like creature that could absorb a certain amount of magical damage a turn. But if the damage exceeded that amount, they would explode with magical energy, damaging everything around them and losing the ability. The party could simply not target them with spells when they are nearby, but nothing is stopping their enemies from targeting them, nor from grouping them to set off a chain reaction.
Honestly, it wouldn't be that strong with just that one feature by itself. It's what else it has and what the situation is around it.
If you throw something at a Level 2 party of 4 that has a Bard, Cleric, Fighter and Warlock that has complete magic immunity, as in zero ability to get targetted by or affected by spells? The Bard probably has a short sword or hand crossbow, the Cleric has a mace, the Fighter has their weapon of choice and the Warlock has their choice of simple weapon. Wizard really is the only class that might be at a true 100% disadvantage, and even then they have their quarterstaff if they would be here. Now, if said creature has 18 AC, 50 hit points, and has multiattack? Now we have a really strong enemy for this group, but if it has 15 AC, 30 HP and does 1d8+2? Much more realistic fight. Magic Immunity is VERY strong, yes, but it's more what it is paired with.
Expanding on it, if the party is higher level and now encounters more of those beings with the same stats? Just because they aren't affected by magic doesn't mean your party isn't. The Cleric can Bless, the Bard can provide inspiration, and the Warlock, well, would probably be kind of useless here in most scenarios. To earlier points, just because they aren't affected by the application of magic doesn't mean they aren't hindered by the after affects of it if it creates some form of tangible non-magical affect. Those characters who aren't able to do their conventional kits can rely on other tactics. Grappling, dodge actions to keep it busy, help action, etc.
We look at the stat block of a Rakshasa(in the basic rules, so I'll post the entire thing), as was mentioned earlier in the thread. Yes, its strong, but it's not strong because it has magic immunity through 6th level. It's strong because of everything else with it. 16 AC, 110 HP, 40 ft move speed, some resistance to physical attacks assuming they aren't magical, and a rather high spell save DC even though RAW it doesn't have any true attack based magic(dominate person is huge), and the potential for a lingering curse. Even then, if you actually encounter it in combat, more than likely its going to try and cast Fly and get the hell out of dodge, because combat wise it doesn't have a big toolkit, it just has a VERY defensive one. If you were to give this ANY sort of true ranged option by default? It's CR immediately jumps up. More if you give it some sort of attack magic, thanks to its high magic attack bonus.
The Flail Snail(its in Volos, will not post it), it has some reflective capability, but it can't control it. Smaller to hit chance, smaller damage, but more attacks depending on HP left. It also has very little movement, so once you discover its gimmick? Assuming you can move away? You're good. If this thing had a 30 foot move speed, and its reach was a bit farther? It'd be a MUCH stronger creature. As it is? It's really not a big threat unless you get trapped in a room with a few of em. One bad AOE, some bad RNG and someone could very easily go down very fast.
Overall, I love the idea of toying with hardcoded "No" concepts in D&D and giving your players truly surprising encounters. Sure, you gotta temper and balance and I think a lot of people here have this initial knee jerk that it can't be done due to bad experiences, but it totally can.
Limited Magic Immunity. The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower unless it wishes to be. It has advantage on saving throws against all other spells and magical effects.
Innate Spellcasting. The rakshasa's innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 18, +10 to hit with spell attacks). The rakshasa can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components:
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack:+7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 9 (2d6 + 2) slashing damage, and the target is cursed if it is a creature. The magical curse takes effect whenever the target takes a short or long rest, filling the target's thoughts with horrible images and dreams. The cursed target gains no benefit from finishing a short or long rest. The curse lasts until it is lifted by a remove curse spell or similar magic.
If you're doing homebrew kinds of things, you can pretty much do whatever sounds right to you. I don't see how it would be harder to kill the stronger you get, you're still able to pick up a non-magical weapon or just improvise something, with better stats than you'd do it at lower levels.
I had a silly idea for a very weak lobster-like creature that could absorb a certain amount of magical damage a turn. But if the damage exceeded that amount, they would explode with magical energy, damaging everything around them and losing the ability. The party could simply not target them with spells when they are nearby, but nothing is stopping their enemies from targeting them, nor from grouping them to set off a chain reaction.
Just to expand a little on the notion of absorbing magic.....
Whenever magic that deals damage is cast at the creature it can absorb half the magic, rather than just halving the damage though, the player casting the spell only rolls half the number of damage dice (rounding down to a minimum of zero dice). If two creatures are targeted by the same spell (such as with burning hands or lightning bolt) they both absorb half the damage dice reducing the spell to zero damage dice. The damage dice they absorb is stored within a spectral "balloon" like membrane which expands from the creatures back as they absorb more energy, this "balloon" radiates abjuration and evocation magic should Detect Magic style abilities be used. The creatures then gain a pool of d6's equal to the amount of damage dice they have absorbed. These dice can be used in the following ways:
1) to add damage to one of their attacks (adding 1d6 force damage per dice expended).
2) to heal themselves (expending one or more d6's and regaining that many hit points).
3) Dispel Magic Breath Weapon (as an action they can exhale a cone of anti magic, this costs 3 dice from their pool and any creature in the cone is affected as per dispel magic cast at 3rd level)
4) Exploding on death (dealing 1d6 force damage per dice they had to every creature within 10ft of where they died).
They can expend a maximum of (insert CR) dice from this pool per round.
Depending on how mean you are as a DM or how good the party is, you could have options 1 & 2 use the creatures bonus action or reaction.
Thanks for everyone's thoughts. ( especially Rob76 and spideycloned! ) I'll start working on a monster similar to this. If/when it is finished, i'll send a link to it here.
I recently thought of a strange idea for a monster - One that has immunity to magical damage. It would become harder to defeat the higher your level. This doesn't exactly make sense in combat, but how bad of an idea would this really be?
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This seems terrible,since spellcasters are completely useless on it (wizard,sorcerer,bard,and warlock are just wrecked,druid,cleric,paladin,and ranger are somewhat reduced in power¨
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It wouldn't be very powerful, it would just be to mess with the party. Say they think they have to use their strongest attacks and magic weapons against a blockage but no, it has to be a nonmagical attack.
i can roll nat 1s on command
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That's basically what the Anti-Magic Cone of a Beholder achieves, except that the cone is directional.
For total immunity, it should either be fairly high CR, or be relatively unthreatening.
I really like this idea.
Maybe have them so their skin appears to be reflective, so that powerful spells end up rebounding upon the party. You could do this with non-magical attacks as well. A 'monster' like this might force the players to role-play and think their way out of the situation, which is a good idea if their characters are becoming mass-murderers. Or if they are 'carrying' a lower level player, that player's attacks or spells might have an effect where the others do not.
If your wizards and sorcerers are getting haughty, you could also try making a home-brew rule that makes certain types of creatures (cats, bears, reptiles etc) resistant to magic, so your fighters and rangers have more of a chance of making an impact.
Well, a lot of high-CR monsters are already pretty much stoked against magic. I mean, all you have to do is give a monster advantage on saving throws against spells, and a couple of daily Legendary Resistances, and you're already rocking something that's gonna frustrate the heck out of your casters. But flat out "immunity" against anything really should have a strong justification. Like, an ancient red dragon is immune to fire damage because - well - duh. Because it's an ancient red dragon. But even Orcus and Demogorgon only have two and one (respectively) damage immunities that aren't just non-magical weapons. And they're both CR 26.
Trust me, advantage on saves OR 3 Legendary Resistances is plenty. Only do both if your party is high level, super overpowered, and you're having a hard time challenging them.
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
Baldur's Gate 2 had such enemies. You could always tell that you were about to fight them because you'd suddenly find a container full of non-magical weapons.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Really can't say much without the full stats. It sounds way too powerful. It could work, but it would need to be easy to kill, kind of a throw-away encounter.
<Insert clever signature here>
Sounds like a fun idea. I think you should try it out despite whatever we strangers on the internet says. Spellcasters might not be able to damage it with offensive magic, but they can certainly still support their teammates, and some spellcaster subclasses can certainly go toe to toe against enemies in melee.
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You could do some variants of the Rakshasa, have them immune to increasing levels of magic, maybe do it on the basis of immunity to a spell level equal to half the highest spell slot available to the party, so a group with level 4 spell slots would come across "rakshasa" with immunityt to lvl 1 & 2 spells. You've also got the Flail snail as well so you could have creatures with an effect similar to their anti magic shell. Another alternative would be to make creatures that are immune to certain a school(s) of magic so you don't completely nerf spell casters.
Give the spellcasters something else to do. Perhaps the magic-nullifying trait/field is generated by a device that can be deactivated through a skill challenge or there is some other alternative goal that they can work towards.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
Most monsters don't "fully" immunize themselves against magic, so there is always a strategy for spellcasters to be effective; A beholder only covers 1/6th of the battlefield with it's eye, a Rakshasa is still vulnerable to magic weaponry and to high level spells, etc.
What I'd do would be a combination of the standard Magical Resistance trait (for save spells) and either the Reflective Carapace trait (for attack spells), or a custom trait that maybe sets a different AC for the creature when they are targeted by spell attacks? (so the creature could be AC 15 normally, but AC 20 for attacks made with spells).
Otherwise, I agree with one of the above posters who said that some environmental effect, other creature, or other goal should be set for casters so they don't feel completely useless.
Using a spell as powerful as that just to make it fall? You make a 10 foot cube vanish from under it. The Move Earth cantrip can make a 5 foot cube so they say. Then you use the same cantrip to bury it.
Without complete stats, we really don't know what the thing is capable of. It's hard to guess what might work, but being immune to magic entirely makes this thing slightly more powerful than the Tarrasque if we don't know it's limitations.
<Insert clever signature here>
The gremishka from Van Richten's Guide would also somewhat fit the idea of a creature that can cause havok for magic wielding adventurers, especially the gremishka swarm with its limited spell immunity and spell reflection abilities. Wouldn't be terribly hard to increase the spell immunity to handle higher level spells and throw on some sort of damage immunities to "magical" bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing weapons. Would definitely increase the normal CR 2 to something a bit higher, but I wouldn't expect it to become overly powerful with only a +4 attack and 24 hit points... More of a nuisance for even higher level characters than dangerous.
"It might be a large creature" True, but we don't know that, now do we? "Also 5' deep is a ditch, not a pit." Semantics. If you want to be technical, a ditch is assumed to be longer than it is wide. If you fall down into it, a five foot cubical hole in the ground is a very small and shallow pit, and a ten foot cubical hole in the ground is just the same thing, only larger.
"You can complain that you do not get to use your full awesome might" Nope, that's not what I am asking for. "or you can do what you can. Your choice." That I agree with.
<Insert clever signature here>
I am smiling. There were a couple of threads where I tried to convince people that Move Earth was more like a magical garden rake then a magical backhoe, and I got no traction at all. Everyone else was convinced that since the area of effect of the spell was a 5 food cube they could dig pits, and bury people inside of them.
A lot of people like to try to squeeze out damage from spells that don't say they do and probably were not meant to, but it is always a matter of interpretation, and people like to get everything they can.
<Insert clever signature here>
If you're doing homebrew kinds of things, you can pretty much do whatever sounds right to you.
I don't see how it would be harder to kill the stronger you get, you're still able to pick up a non-magical weapon or just improvise something, with better stats than you'd do it at lower levels.
I had a silly idea for a very weak lobster-like creature that could absorb a certain amount of magical damage a turn.
But if the damage exceeded that amount, they would explode with magical energy, damaging everything around them and losing the ability.
The party could simply not target them with spells when they are nearby, but nothing is stopping their enemies from targeting them, nor from grouping them to set off a chain reaction.
Honestly, it wouldn't be that strong with just that one feature by itself. It's what else it has and what the situation is around it.
If you throw something at a Level 2 party of 4 that has a Bard, Cleric, Fighter and Warlock that has complete magic immunity, as in zero ability to get targetted by or affected by spells? The Bard probably has a short sword or hand crossbow, the Cleric has a mace, the Fighter has their weapon of choice and the Warlock has their choice of simple weapon. Wizard really is the only class that might be at a true 100% disadvantage, and even then they have their quarterstaff if they would be here. Now, if said creature has 18 AC, 50 hit points, and has multiattack? Now we have a really strong enemy for this group, but if it has 15 AC, 30 HP and does 1d8+2? Much more realistic fight. Magic Immunity is VERY strong, yes, but it's more what it is paired with.
Expanding on it, if the party is higher level and now encounters more of those beings with the same stats? Just because they aren't affected by magic doesn't mean your party isn't. The Cleric can Bless, the Bard can provide inspiration, and the Warlock, well, would probably be kind of useless here in most scenarios. To earlier points, just because they aren't affected by the application of magic doesn't mean they aren't hindered by the after affects of it if it creates some form of tangible non-magical affect. Those characters who aren't able to do their conventional kits can rely on other tactics. Grappling, dodge actions to keep it busy, help action, etc.
We look at the stat block of a Rakshasa(in the basic rules, so I'll post the entire thing), as was mentioned earlier in the thread. Yes, its strong, but it's not strong because it has magic immunity through 6th level. It's strong because of everything else with it. 16 AC, 110 HP, 40 ft move speed, some resistance to physical attacks assuming they aren't magical, and a rather high spell save DC even though RAW it doesn't have any true attack based magic(dominate person is huge), and the potential for a lingering curse. Even then, if you actually encounter it in combat, more than likely its going to try and cast Fly and get the hell out of dodge, because combat wise it doesn't have a big toolkit, it just has a VERY defensive one. If you were to give this ANY sort of true ranged option by default? It's CR immediately jumps up. More if you give it some sort of attack magic, thanks to its high magic attack bonus.
The Flail Snail(its in Volos, will not post it), it has some reflective capability, but it can't control it. Smaller to hit chance, smaller damage, but more attacks depending on HP left. It also has very little movement, so once you discover its gimmick? Assuming you can move away? You're good. If this thing had a 30 foot move speed, and its reach was a bit farther? It'd be a MUCH stronger creature. As it is? It's really not a big threat unless you get trapped in a room with a few of em. One bad AOE, some bad RNG and someone could very easily go down very fast.
Overall, I love the idea of toying with hardcoded "No" concepts in D&D and giving your players truly surprising encounters. Sure, you gotta temper and balance and I think a lot of people here have this initial knee jerk that it can't be done due to bad experiences, but it totally can.
Just to expand a little on the notion of absorbing magic.....
You could use a Chuul as a base creature (or the Homarid from the Planeshift Dominaria setting, link here: https://media.wizards.com/2018/downloads/magic/Plane_Shift_Dominaria.pdf).
Creature type changes to Aberration.
Absorb magic ability functions as:
Whenever magic that deals damage is cast at the creature it can absorb half the magic, rather than just halving the damage though, the player casting the spell only rolls half the number of damage dice (rounding down to a minimum of zero dice). If two creatures are targeted by the same spell (such as with burning hands or lightning bolt) they both absorb half the damage dice reducing the spell to zero damage dice. The damage dice they absorb is stored within a spectral "balloon" like membrane which expands from the creatures back as they absorb more energy, this "balloon" radiates abjuration and evocation magic should Detect Magic style abilities be used. The creatures then gain a pool of d6's equal to the amount of damage dice they have absorbed. These dice can be used in the following ways:
1) to add damage to one of their attacks (adding 1d6 force damage per dice expended).
2) to heal themselves (expending one or more d6's and regaining that many hit points).
3) Dispel Magic Breath Weapon (as an action they can exhale a cone of anti magic, this costs 3 dice from their pool and any creature in the cone is affected as per dispel magic cast at 3rd level)
4) Exploding on death (dealing 1d6 force damage per dice they had to every creature within 10ft of where they died).
They can expend a maximum of (insert CR) dice from this pool per round.
Depending on how mean you are as a DM or how good the party is, you could have options 1 & 2 use the creatures bonus action or reaction.
Thanks for everyone's thoughts. ( especially Rob76 and spideycloned! ) I'll start working on a monster similar to this. If/when it is finished, i'll send a link to it here.
i can roll nat 1s on command
my homebrew thingies
Magic Items - Monsters - Subclasses