So I'm running a level 17 one-shot this weekend for a few friends in which we fight an adult red dragon. The characters are a Rogue (unknown subclass, I'll be helping her with character creation tomorrow), a Wild Magic Barbarian, an Evoker Wizard and a Grave Cleric. I've decided to add some more low-level mooks into the fight so that the Grave Cleric's capstone feature, Keeper of Souls, will actually see use more than once. I was thinking kobolds initially, because they're thematically appropriate—but the problem is they absolutely will all go down to one of the Wizard's AoE spells in round one if I'm not careful, and I don't want the martials to feel overshadowed or, worse, useless. Any suggestions for a few more durable mooks I could add in to be something other than just cannon fodder to feed into the Wizard's magical meat grinder? I'm thinking something around CR 3–5 would be appropriate. I could've sworn I once saw a stat block for a dragon knight or something on here, but I can't find it now. . . Alternatively, I could just boost the HP of the kobolds so they don't go down right away to fireball—but again, that could take away some of the fun for the martials. (I'm planning to offer cleave rules. Methinks they'll get a kick out of that.) Suggestions, please? Thanks! :)
magma mephits and smoke mephits are pretty durable for their CR, and smoke mephits are actually pretty useful to a dragon (because it has blindsight. If you want to use kobolds, remember that a lot of generic npcs are Any Race.
In general martials in 5e are much better as boss killers than as mook slayers, so the best way to make the martials have fun is by not using mooks.
If it's fireball that you're worried about, maybe you could give kobolds within 15 or 20 feet of the dragon resistance or immunity to fire damage. Maybe give the dragon a reaction that lets it use its wings to shield all other creatures around it from an AoE. So that it doesn't feel like a total loss if you cast a spell and have it completely blocked, maybe it deals a bit of extra damage to the dragon as well.
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One thing I had considered is the new(ish) dragon-people in Fizbans (I can't remember their name). The biggest ones have an ability that they can shapeshift into the last thing they killed.
Could be an awesome and thematic way to show "the dragon killed the whole village with their minions", by having the people of the village (yes, I rewrote that) fighting alongside the dragon, only to be revealed as much more dangerous foes!
So I'm running a level 17 one-shot this weekend for a few friends in which we fight an adult red dragon. The characters are a Rogue (unknown subclass, I'll be helping her with character creation tomorrow), a Wild Magic Barbarian, an Evoker Wizard and a Grave Cleric. I've decided to add some more low-level mooks into the fight so that the Grave Cleric's capstone feature, Keeper of Souls, will actually see use more than once. I was thinking kobolds initially, because they're thematically appropriate—but the problem is they absolutely will all go down to one of the Wizard's AoE spells in round one if I'm not careful, and I don't want the martials to feel overshadowed or, worse, useless. Any suggestions for a few more durable mooks I could add in to be something other than just cannon fodder to feed into the Wizard's magical meat grinder? I'm thinking something around CR 3–5 would be appropriate. I could've sworn I once saw a stat block for a dragon knight or something on here, but I can't find it now. . . Alternatively, I could just boost the HP of the kobolds so they don't go down right away to fireball—but again, that could take away some of the fun for the martials. (I'm planning to offer cleave rules. Methinks they'll get a kick out of that.) Suggestions, please? Thanks! :)
Kobolds, when used appropriately, can absolutely wreck house. A Kobold Dragonshield taking the Dodge Action in melee, and several Kobolds using guerilla ranged tactics from doorways / shadows to pelt the party with sling stones is a good time. Using a Kobold Scale Sorcerer against party members that are stuck in Oozes or Slimes, or even a Sand Pit Trap causes the party to have to prioritize what condition is survivable and what isn't.
If you're using them specifically in the Minion role for a boss, consider borrowing the some of the Minion traits from 4e:
1 HP
attacks that deal half damage on a miss / failed save deal none
You could also consider massing 4-6 kobolds together into a medium or large sized swarm of kobolds using the template for swarm of insects.
Kobolds aren't intimidating if you think of them as a single creature. Kobolds become troublesome when you use them as the ecology and environment of the dungeon/lair. The same could be said of any creature that alters its environment to maximize its chances for survival.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
magma mephits and smoke mephits are pretty durable for their CR, and smoke mephits are actually pretty useful to a dragon (because it has blindsight. If you want to use kobolds, remember that a lot of generic npcs are Any Race.
In general martials in 5e are much better as boss killers than as mook slayers, so the best way to make the martials have fun is by not using mooks.
Ah, I didn't know that!! (I played exclusively full casters before I started DMing.)
* Salamanders (CR 5) - Fire immunity, so Red Dragon isn't worried about their breath weapon wiping out their mooks. Or Frost Salamanders if you want to give the party a hard time by forcing them to adapt to 2 types of elemental damage.
* Griffons (CR 2) - Flight and multiattack. Great minions for challenging the vertical aspect of terrain control.
* Ropers (CR 5) - Both as sentries and as muscle. Also smart enough to take orders from a Dragon. The Restrained condition can be pretty strong, so I would say only use these if you're confident that the party is able to play as a team and knows their own abilities pretty well.
One thing I had considered is the new(ish) dragon-people in Fizbans (I can't remember their name). The biggest ones have an ability that they can shapeshift into the last thing they killed.
Could be an awesome and thematic way to show "the dragon killed the whole village with their minions", by having the people of the village (yes, I rewrote that) fighting alongside the dragon, only to be revealed as much more dangerous foes!
Draconians? and the [Tooltip Not Found]. A fun plot could be that a draconian ( perhaps a half dragon child or creation of the dragon) has taken over a kobold or lizard tribe to make them subservient to the dragon by impersonating their leader.
Also it's weird that the infiltrator doesnt have shape theft but what ever...
magma mephits and smoke mephits are pretty durable for their CR, and smoke mephits are actually pretty useful to a dragon (because it has blindsight. If you want to use kobolds, remember that a lot of generic npcs are Any Race.
In general martials in 5e are much better as boss killers than as mook slayers, so the best way to make the martials have fun is by not using mooks.
Also if you are worried about weak mephits you can make a big swarm. Heck a big enough swarm could almost make a dragon itself if they flew in formation and combined their breath weapons.
Could be fun to have a dragon with elemental dopelgangers made of a mephit swarm.
* Salamanders (CR 5) - Fire immunity, so Red Dragon isn't worried about their breath weapon wiping out their mooks. Or Frost Salamanders if you want to give the party a hard time by forcing them to adapt to 2 types of elemental damage.
* Griffons (CR 2) - Flight and multiattack. Great minions for challenging the vertical aspect of terrain control.
* Ropers (CR 5) - Both as sentries and as muscle. Also smart enough to take orders from a Dragon. The Restrained condition can be pretty strong, so I would say only use these if you're confident that the party is able to play as a team and knows their own abilities pretty well.
Ropers give me the vibe of a dragon that doesn't clean their lair properly. You would have all kinds of oozes and things that make the lair all messy and gross with these bottom feeders that eat the dragons scraps.
Griffons feel like the dragon is closely connected to nature with all kinds of animal and beast minions.
Or to be really nasty, a group of leveled Dragonborn working under the dragon. Set them as maybe a level below the PCs and equip them with some dragontouched items from the dragon’s hoard. Other good dragon minions/lair inhabitants are things like gargoyles, Azeris, bugbears, chimeras, croakers, flame skulls, half dragons, hell hounds, helmed horrors, lizard folk, magmin, piercers, rust monsters, and shield guardians. Some may just be permitted to live/lair there as part of the dragon lair traps and tricks while others can be more active servitors- possibly in a layered defense in depth.
So I'm running a level 17 one-shot this weekend for a few friends in which we fight an adult red dragon. The characters are a Rogue (unknown subclass, I'll be helping her with character creation tomorrow), a Wild Magic Barbarian, an Evoker Wizard and a Grave Cleric. I've decided to add some more low-level mooks into the fight so that the Grave Cleric's capstone feature, Keeper of Souls, will actually see use more than once. I was thinking kobolds initially, because they're thematically appropriate—but the problem is they absolutely will all go down to one of the Wizard's AoE spells in round one if I'm not careful, and I don't want the martials to feel overshadowed or, worse, useless. Any suggestions for a few more durable mooks I could add in to be something other than just cannon fodder to feed into the Wizard's magical meat grinder? I'm thinking something around CR 3–5 would be appropriate. I could've sworn I once saw a stat block for a dragon knight or something on here, but I can't find it now. . . Alternatively, I could just boost the HP of the kobolds so they don't go down right away to fireball—but again, that could take away some of the fun for the martials. (I'm planning to offer cleave rules. Methinks they'll get a kick out of that.) Suggestions, please? Thanks! :)
magma mephits and smoke mephits are pretty durable for their CR, and smoke mephits are actually pretty useful to a dragon (because it has blindsight. If you want to use kobolds, remember that a lot of generic npcs are Any Race.
In general martials in 5e are much better as boss killers than as mook slayers, so the best way to make the martials have fun is by not using mooks.
If it's fireball that you're worried about, maybe you could give kobolds within 15 or 20 feet of the dragon resistance or immunity to fire damage. Maybe give the dragon a reaction that lets it use its wings to shield all other creatures around it from an AoE. So that it doesn't feel like a total loss if you cast a spell and have it completely blocked, maybe it deals a bit of extra damage to the dragon as well.
Instead of kobolds, you could also have red dragon wyrmlings, half-dragons, fire elementals, and I can imagine a number of things from Dragonlace, which is a book that I don't have.
Look at what you've done. You spoiled it. You have nobody to blame but yourself. Go sit and think about your actions.
Don't be mean. Rudeness is a vicious cycle, and it has to stop somewhere. Exceptions for things that are funny.
Go to the current Competition of the Finest 'Brews! It's a cool place where cool people make cool things.
How I'm posting based on text formatting: Mod Hat Off - Mod Hat Also Off (I'm not a mod)
It depends on the dragon. Minions are a big way to show their character.
One thing I had considered is the new(ish) dragon-people in Fizbans (I can't remember their name). The biggest ones have an ability that they can shapeshift into the last thing they killed.
Could be an awesome and thematic way to show "the dragon killed the whole village with their minions", by having the people of the village (yes, I rewrote that) fighting alongside the dragon, only to be revealed as much more dangerous foes!
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Kobolds, when used appropriately, can absolutely wreck house. A Kobold Dragonshield taking the Dodge Action in melee, and several Kobolds using guerilla ranged tactics from doorways / shadows to pelt the party with sling stones is a good time. Using a Kobold Scale Sorcerer against party members that are stuck in Oozes or Slimes, or even a Sand Pit Trap causes the party to have to prioritize what condition is survivable and what isn't.
If you're using them specifically in the Minion role for a boss, consider borrowing the some of the Minion traits from 4e:
You could also consider massing 4-6 kobolds together into a medium or large sized swarm of kobolds using the template for swarm of insects.
Kobolds aren't intimidating if you think of them as a single creature. Kobolds become troublesome when you use them as the ecology and environment of the dungeon/lair. The same could be said of any creature that alters its environment to maximize its chances for survival.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
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Ah, I didn't know that!! (I played exclusively full casters before I started DMing.)
Thanks for the tips, everyone!!
A few more possibilities:
* Salamanders (CR 5) - Fire immunity, so Red Dragon isn't worried about their breath weapon wiping out their mooks. Or Frost Salamanders if you want to give the party a hard time by forcing them to adapt to 2 types of elemental damage.
* Griffons (CR 2) - Flight and multiattack. Great minions for challenging the vertical aspect of terrain control.
* Ropers (CR 5) - Both as sentries and as muscle. Also smart enough to take orders from a Dragon. The Restrained condition can be pretty strong, so I would say only use these if you're confident that the party is able to play as a team and knows their own abilities pretty well.
Draconians? and the [Tooltip Not Found]. A fun plot could be that a draconian ( perhaps a half dragon child or creation of the dragon) has taken over a kobold or lizard tribe to make them subservient to the dragon by impersonating their leader.
Also it's weird that the infiltrator doesnt have shape theft but what ever...
Also if you are worried about weak mephits you can make a big swarm. Heck a big enough swarm could almost make a dragon itself if they flew in formation and combined their breath weapons.
Could be fun to have a dragon with elemental dopelgangers made of a mephit swarm.
Ropers give me the vibe of a dragon that doesn't clean their lair properly. You would have all kinds of oozes and things that make the lair all messy and gross with these bottom feeders that eat the dragons scraps.
Griffons feel like the dragon is closely connected to nature with all kinds of animal and beast minions.
Or to be really nasty, a group of leveled Dragonborn working under the dragon. Set them as maybe a level below the PCs and equip them with some dragontouched items from the dragon’s hoard.
Other good dragon minions/lair inhabitants are things like gargoyles, Azeris, bugbears, chimeras, croakers, flame skulls, half dragons, hell hounds, helmed horrors, lizard folk, magmin, piercers, rust monsters, and shield guardians. Some may just be permitted to live/lair there as part of the dragon lair traps and tricks while others can be more active servitors- possibly in a layered defense in depth.
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