My D&D group recently asked me to create a unique custom world. I have created an entire customer map, story and adventure, and my idea is that the world would grow as the players progressed. I am currently making a interesting 5th level boss am I am looking for thoughts on the character.
His name is Malonne the Masochist
What is interesting about Malonne is that he is a deranged Wood Elf driven mad by a holy artifact. He has a magical dagger that allows him to inflict damage on himself, the player must make a constitution saving throw, on a fail the player takes the damage, on save Malonne takes the damage. He has a pretty high health, lowish AC, high dex and high con. I was also playing with the idea of making him very fast so that he could roll to dodge any non-magical attack with a dex saving throw as a reaction.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this or ways that I could improve him?
That is not a bad idea. I was going to just going to give him higher than normal health to prevent it from dropping too low from self inflicted wounds, assuming he rolls really baddly each time. I like the idea of self inflicted damage being added as a weapon bonus.
Bosses should probably have either minions as support, or legendary actions (that could be provided by the artifact). Otherwise, they tend to just be dead in a few rounds, and don't have time to make an impact on the party.
Maybe this Malonne character should be leader of a cult of masochistic devotees. Armaments might be whips, chains, and daggers. Since this is a deranged wood elf, maybe add some unusual beasts like giant leeches, porcupines, rot grubs as experimental subjects or "pets."
I don't know if it will have the impact you're after. Against a party of 6, how many rounds do you think this guy will last? 3 or 4? If he rolls bad, he might only damage someone in the party once in the whole fight. He definitely needs other minions to soak up some of the fight and extend it. Maybe you could even extend the damage transfer to apply to him or any of his allies. So he can stab his own guys and transfer the damage to the party that way too, and playing up his twisted nature, killing his own allies.
Another option would be something a little less obvious to the party such as a "Cilice". It's an old school belt that was used for self harm by the clergy. Something like this has cool flavour, and also the possibility that he could use it without the party immediately realising that he is doing it and causing them damage. It would just happen without apparent reason. Play him up as talking to them, drawing out the encounter with RP, all the while dealing damage to the party without them realise HE is the cause of the damage. He could be on the ground, wracked with pain. Hell, the party may even end up thinking they need to help him, he's in such torment.
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Hello all.
My D&D group recently asked me to create a unique custom world. I have created an entire customer map, story and adventure, and my idea is that the world would grow as the players progressed. I am currently making a interesting 5th level boss am I am looking for thoughts on the character.
His name is Malonne the Masochist
What is interesting about Malonne is that he is a deranged Wood Elf driven mad by a holy artifact. He has a magical dagger that allows him to inflict damage on himself, the player must make a constitution saving throw, on a fail the player takes the damage, on save Malonne takes the damage. He has a pretty high health, lowish AC, high dex and high con. I was also playing with the idea of making him very fast so that he could roll to dodge any non-magical attack with a dex saving throw as a reaction.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this or ways that I could improve him?
That is not a bad idea. I was going to just going to give him higher than normal health to prevent it from dropping too low from self inflicted wounds, assuming he rolls really baddly each time. I like the idea of self inflicted damage being added as a weapon bonus.
Bosses should probably have either minions as support, or legendary actions (that could be provided by the artifact). Otherwise, they tend to just be dead in a few rounds, and don't have time to make an impact on the party.
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Maybe this Malonne character should be leader of a cult of masochistic devotees. Armaments might be whips, chains, and daggers. Since this is a deranged wood elf, maybe add some unusual beasts like giant leeches, porcupines, rot grubs as experimental subjects or "pets."
I don't know if it will have the impact you're after. Against a party of 6, how many rounds do you think this guy will last? 3 or 4? If he rolls bad, he might only damage someone in the party once in the whole fight. He definitely needs other minions to soak up some of the fight and extend it. Maybe you could even extend the damage transfer to apply to him or any of his allies. So he can stab his own guys and transfer the damage to the party that way too, and playing up his twisted nature, killing his own allies.
Another option would be something a little less obvious to the party such as a "Cilice". It's an old school belt that was used for self harm by the clergy. Something like this has cool flavour, and also the possibility that he could use it without the party immediately realising that he is doing it and causing them damage. It would just happen without apparent reason. Play him up as talking to them, drawing out the encounter with RP, all the while dealing damage to the party without them realise HE is the cause of the damage. He could be on the ground, wracked with pain. Hell, the party may even end up thinking they need to help him, he's in such torment.