hey guys im new to Dnd and DMing but me and my players decided to start off with a long campaign broken into 7 chapters now there almost done with the first chapter but im not quite sure what i wanna do for a final boss. now the villain in the entire campaign is a half dark elf half high elf (obviously hes pissed at the world but super op) and my players have just seen him before he disappears so they know hes behind all the mayhem and chaos thats been going around the local village (lycanthropes that my villain has magically forced them into there animal- humanoid form and makes them do his bidding) but my players have defeated all the lycanthrope and has found the people they were suppose to rescue but the villain (half drow half high elf) has created some kind of portal and something evil is about to come out... i just dont know what cause im still new. now i have been kind relaxed on the rules and if my player has 2 hit pts left and my monster roles a 18 ill tell them he misses but towards the end i wanted it more challenging and now my guys are new death and healing as fast as they can to prepare for the worst so i want something big and intimidating but im ok with lowering some stats and rolls on it for the sake of the game. so can you guys help me with choosing a monster??? please and thank you
It's very unlikely that you can plan ahead as far as you seem to want to. The Players will make very likely make choices in the game which will radically change whatever you plan "7 chapters" in advance.
If you have a main villain in mind, it helps you plan if you know:
What does the Villain want, or want to do overall? Every villain has a goal. Why does the Villain want it? Also, what is a fully 3-dimensional description of this character (after all he's a pretty important Character in the story - as important as the Party! - he needs to be more complex than "half dark elf half high elf" )?
What does the Villain know, or believe - especially about the actions of the Players' Characters?
What resources does the Villain have at hand, and what are their capabilities?
If you have all of the above, and stop to re-evaluate it every time the Players do something that significantly change events, then it's easy for you to figure out what the Villain will try and do next. You just role-play the Villain - i.e. make choices from their point-of-view.
In retrospect, you'll need to figure out what the overall goal of your Villain is, what the creation of the Lycanthropes was supposed to have accomplished, and why he's now opened a portal.
If you have all that figured out, then you don't need advice on what should be coming out if it; you'll be able to figure out pretty easily what he will have summoned, and why.
I would also stronglycaution about you fudging the dice in favor of the Players! You might think you're doing it for "the sake of the game" - but it's your Players' game. Trust that your Players can actually play :p
Almost nothing pisses off Players faster than learning the DM is either persecuting them, or "hand holding" them.
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thank you i apreciate your input and yes i have develped a back story for my villian and his goal is to wipe out all races in his realm with... something. i wanted to do this portal again at the end making this first one look like a failed weak attempt of summoning... something. as for planning im doing that chapter by chapter trying to nudge my players to my planned ending but everything in between is pretty much improved or thought up the day before ( i figured my players are wild and random might as well go with the flow) so i have general ideas on how i want the campaign to go but dont expect my players to go with it unless there is a reward of some sort and even then they try to over throw the government of the village there suppose to save and kill the king who was going to give them the reward. i think i have an idea on what to summon though thanks!
I would use something that reflects the tone of the next chapter. This one was all about werewolves, fine. if the next is about the frozen north, use something from there. Maybe a young white dragon or something, or something along that line. If they're going into the desert, use something from there. As a precursor and to get your players excited about whats next. This should (hopefully) helpy keep them on the path your setting without railroading.
well in each chapter im trying to incorporate something with each character like in this chapter it started with one of my characters wife and children getting taken by some were-rats and disappearing into a magical portal later they find out were the lycanthropes are taking people from a nearby village that has been harassed by them for some time so they go to the dungeon and at the end of it find the villain is sacrificing the people and finds his wife dead. so in the next chapter i want to use some of my players elf druid backstory which long story short she was a hermit that found a human baby that she raised and then grew to love till some humans stole the child who was around 12 at the time and she has never seen her since so i was thinking of bringing the human child in the next chapter i was thinking of having a group of bandits steal something or kidnap someone and an NPC is willing to pay a hefty price to have it or them returned safely and as they go on this quest some how things dont go the way they planned and they meet the leader of a group of bandits and she is the child from the druids backstory and tells them more about my villain and were to find him or an associate of his and maybe more clues as to what his plan is and that would lead in to the next chapter
Perhaps a CR6-7 Monster. I would go with the previous Animal/Lycanthrope theme and if you were using Were-Rats for the party currently, introduce some Fiendish Dire Rat Beast from the portal. This creature should be built to challenge the party, and as Vexadent said do not try to save your PCs lives...that is their job. I would reskin a Troll and add on some extra HP (20 or so) up the AC to represent even FASTER healing, and make it vulnerable to silver and not fire and acid.
Did the bad guy disappear through the portal? If so the players don't know where he went, but if he throws an enemy at them through the portal that would give them a clue as to where to start searching for him next. If the players keep interrupting his portal attempts to summon something really big, it stands to reason he may only get a small portal opened for him to escape and throw a delay in their path. As the game goes on, the players keep catching up with him and interrupting his plans portals get bigger and bigger because the players level up and get more experience so too does the bad guy. With it culminating in him successfully opening the portal he wants to open, you could then kill all of your players and start them with new characters 5 years later in this new changed world bringing new challenges. Maybe the big bad didn't destroy all races, maybe they are all (including him) enslaved by some demonic entity who he had made a (badly worded) deal with? Big bad thought he was ending all life, wording was "all life as you know it". (If you don't want to kill your players you could always banish them, imprison them etc etc) Or they reach him just as he is about to open the portal, queue big fight, bad guy dies they are now heroes. The end and they all lived happily ever after!
Perhaps a CR6-7 Monster. I would go with the previous Animal/Lycanthrope theme and if you were using Were-Rats for the party currently, introduce some Fiendish Dire Rat Beast from the portal. This creature should be built to challenge the party, and as Vexadent said do not try to save your PCs lives...that is their job. I would reskin a Troll and add on some extra HP (20 or so) up the AC to represent even FASTER healing, and make it vulnerable to silver and not fire and acid.
I was thinking about something along these lines. Either boosting the stats of a werebear or reskinning another monster to make a rabid werebear. The Druid (or anyone actually) may know that werebears are not usually this savage and wonder what corrupted it. They find clues that lead to the town/region it came from, upon arriving hear stories about bandits allied with terrible shape shifting monsters...roll into your next chapter.
im liking your ideas i may implement some of this but no he didnt go through the portal i told my players that he seemed to mysteriously began to fade out of existence. i think i might make it so that the bandits are being blackmailed to gather people for my villians rituals and lycanthropes army also i was thinking more of like a monster from another plane of existence coming through the portal but cr 6-7 sounds right.
If lycanthropes are taking people from the village then someone is clearly organizing them. Your "big bad" for the end should be whoever or whatever is organizing and directing the lycanthropes. Maybe a hobgoblin warlord or a mezzoloth with some lower level minions. Why are they directing the lycanthropes? Maybe the mezzoloth was hired by a devil for some purpose. Maybe a yuan-ti pit master has magically enthralled the lycanthropes to collect sacrifices to Merrshaulk... Or maybe it's a warlock of the great old one doing the same...
Don't just grab a random monster and get hit with "wait, why is there a vrock down here?" Tie it into your story.
what if my villain just decided that lycanthropes would be a good creature to control and do his bidding while he worked on his real goal... summoning a tarrasque. and when my players found him he was in the middle of a practice run of summoning other plane creatures and summoned a draegloth cause he has a deal with a glabrezu has been teaching him and manipulating well maybe not manipulating cause my villain just wants to destroy everything even himself but you get the idea
I don't what class the half elf villain is. If he comes from a dark elf city he probably has some demon knowledge. He could be conjuring demons. He could have all this time, been seduced by a fey entity. And she/he is the one who behind it. The far realm is also good, but it requires you to make your own monsters. Because the far realm usually spawns things with a CR of 10 or more from what I can remember of the top of my head. Maybe have a lot of CR 1/4. Maybe a whole lot of imps, or a whole lot of the spined devils or such. Can't remember a spined devils CR but if he is opening up a portal. It could be on big dude. But when your party is at different levels, I would recommend to be extra careful with two big bad evil villains. A leveled (as in different levels for almost every character), can probably defend itself better against a horde of say, undead from the shadowfell. (Skeletons of course. Zombies are much more dangerous in zombie.) Than against say, a balgura and the half elf.
Think about his motives, plans, is he truly the master, or does he see himself as it, but isn't. Etc. What is his class? A spellcaster would have a lot of defense against melee combat when at their home turf. Also, have a planned for what happens if the half elf success. Which can and should be a very possible outcome! Good luck my friend! Hope it works out! ^^
Mind Flayers are a fun villian to throw in. Though they can be tough so you would want to either wait until the players are stong enough or dumb down it's stats.
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-Sol
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hey guys im new to Dnd and DMing but me and my players decided to start off with a long campaign broken into 7 chapters now there almost done with the first chapter but im not quite sure what i wanna do for a final boss. now the villain in the entire campaign is a half dark elf half high elf (obviously hes pissed at the world but super op) and my players have just seen him before he disappears so they know hes behind all the mayhem and chaos thats been going around the local village (lycanthropes that my villain has magically forced them into there animal- humanoid form and makes them do his bidding) but my players have defeated all the lycanthrope and has found the people they were suppose to rescue but the villain (half drow half high elf) has created some kind of portal and something evil is about to come out... i just dont know what cause im still new. now i have been kind relaxed on the rules and if my player has 2 hit pts left and my monster roles a 18 ill tell them he misses but towards the end i wanted it more challenging and now my guys are new death and healing as fast as they can to prepare for the worst so i want something big and intimidating but im ok with lowering some stats and rolls on it for the sake of the game. so can you guys help me with choosing a monster??? please and thank you
Hmm ... a couple of points.
If you have all of the above, and stop to re-evaluate it every time the Players do something that significantly change events, then it's easy for you to figure out what the Villain will try and do next. You just role-play the Villain - i.e. make choices from their point-of-view.
In retrospect, you'll need to figure out what the overall goal of your Villain is, what the creation of the Lycanthropes was supposed to have accomplished, and why he's now opened a portal.
If you have all that figured out, then you don't need advice on what should be coming out if it; you'll be able to figure out pretty easily what he will have summoned, and why.
I would also strongly caution about you fudging the dice in favor of the Players! You might think you're doing it for "the sake of the game" - but it's your Players' game. Trust that your Players can actually play :p
Almost nothing pisses off Players faster than learning the DM is either persecuting them, or "hand holding" them.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
thank you i apreciate your input and yes i have develped a back story for my villian and his goal is to wipe out all races in his realm with... something. i wanted to do this portal again at the end making this first one look like a failed weak attempt of summoning... something. as for planning im doing that chapter by chapter trying to nudge my players to my planned ending but everything in between is pretty much improved or thought up the day before ( i figured my players are wild and random might as well go with the flow) so i have general ideas on how i want the campaign to go but dont expect my players to go with it unless there is a reward of some sort and even then they try to over throw the government of the village there suppose to save and kill the king who was going to give them the reward. i think i have an idea on what to summon though thanks!
I would use something that reflects the tone of the next chapter. This one was all about werewolves, fine. if the next is about the frozen north, use something from there. Maybe a young white dragon or something, or something along that line. If they're going into the desert, use something from there. As a precursor and to get your players excited about whats next. This should (hopefully) helpy keep them on the path your setting without railroading.
What plans do you have for the next chapter?
well in each chapter im trying to incorporate something with each character like in this chapter it started with one of my characters wife and children getting taken by some were-rats and disappearing into a magical portal later they find out were the lycanthropes are taking people from a nearby village that has been harassed by them for some time so they go to the dungeon and at the end of it find the villain is sacrificing the people and finds his wife dead. so in the next chapter i want to use some of my players elf druid backstory which long story short she was a hermit that found a human baby that she raised and then grew to love till some humans stole the child who was around 12 at the time and she has never seen her since so i was thinking of bringing the human child in the next chapter i was thinking of having a group of bandits steal something or kidnap someone and an NPC is willing to pay a hefty price to have it or them returned safely and as they go on this quest some how things dont go the way they planned and they meet the leader of a group of bandits and she is the child from the druids backstory and tells them more about my villain and were to find him or an associate of his and maybe more clues as to what his plan is and that would lead in to the next chapter
How many and what level(s) is your party?
5 and 1 is lvl 4, 3 are lvl 5, and one just got to lvl 6
Perhaps a CR6-7 Monster. I would go with the previous Animal/Lycanthrope theme and if you were using Were-Rats for the party currently, introduce some Fiendish Dire Rat Beast from the portal. This creature should be built to challenge the party, and as Vexadent said do not try to save your PCs lives...that is their job. I would reskin a Troll and add on some extra HP (20 or so) up the AC to represent even FASTER healing, and make it vulnerable to silver and not fire and acid.
Did the bad guy disappear through the portal? If so the players don't know where he went, but if he throws an enemy at them through the portal that would give them a clue as to where to start searching for him next. If the players keep interrupting his portal attempts to summon something really big, it stands to reason he may only get a small portal opened for him to escape and throw a delay in their path. As the game goes on, the players keep catching up with him and interrupting his plans portals get bigger and bigger because the players level up and get more experience so too does the bad guy.
With it culminating in him successfully opening the portal he wants to open, you could then kill all of your players and start them with new characters 5 years later in this new changed world bringing new challenges. Maybe the big bad didn't destroy all races, maybe they are all (including him) enslaved by some demonic entity who he had made a (badly worded) deal with? Big bad thought he was ending all life, wording was "all life as you know it". (If you don't want to kill your players you could always banish them, imprison them etc etc)
Or they reach him just as he is about to open the portal, queue big fight, bad guy dies they are now heroes. The end and they all lived happily ever after!
From Within Chaos Comes Order!
I was thinking about something along these lines. Either boosting the stats of a werebear or reskinning another monster to make a rabid werebear. The Druid (or anyone actually) may know that werebears are not usually this savage and wonder what corrupted it. They find clues that lead to the town/region it came from, upon arriving hear stories about bandits allied with terrible shape shifting monsters...roll into your next chapter.
im liking your ideas i may implement some of this but no he didnt go through the portal i told my players that he seemed to mysteriously began to fade out of existence. i think i might make it so that the bandits are being blackmailed to gather people for my villians rituals and lycanthropes army also i was thinking more of like a monster from another plane of existence coming through the portal but cr 6-7 sounds right.
If lycanthropes are taking people from the village then someone is clearly organizing them. Your "big bad" for the end should be whoever or whatever is organizing and directing the lycanthropes. Maybe a hobgoblin warlord or a mezzoloth with some lower level minions. Why are they directing the lycanthropes? Maybe the mezzoloth was hired by a devil for some purpose. Maybe a yuan-ti pit master has magically enthralled the lycanthropes to collect sacrifices to Merrshaulk... Or maybe it's a warlock of the great old one doing the same...
Don't just grab a random monster and get hit with "wait, why is there a vrock down here?" Tie it into your story.
what if my villain just decided that lycanthropes would be a good creature to control and do his bidding while he worked on his real goal... summoning a tarrasque. and when my players found him he was in the middle of a practice run of summoning other plane creatures and summoned a draegloth cause he has a deal with a glabrezu has been teaching him and manipulating well maybe not manipulating cause my villain just wants to destroy everything even himself but you get the idea
I don't what class the half elf villain is. If he comes from a dark elf city he probably has some demon knowledge. He could be conjuring demons. He could have all this time, been seduced by a fey entity. And she/he is the one who behind it. The far realm is also good, but it requires you to make your own monsters. Because the far realm usually spawns things with a CR of 10 or more from what I can remember of the top of my head. Maybe have a lot of CR 1/4. Maybe a whole lot of imps, or a whole lot of the spined devils or such. Can't remember a spined devils CR but if he is opening up a portal. It could be on big dude. But when your party is at different levels, I would recommend to be extra careful with two big bad evil villains. A leveled (as in different levels for almost every character), can probably defend itself better against a horde of say, undead from the shadowfell. (Skeletons of course. Zombies are much more dangerous in zombie.) Than against say, a balgura and the half elf.
Think about his motives, plans, is he truly the master, or does he see himself as it, but isn't. Etc. What is his class? A spellcaster would have a lot of defense against melee combat when at their home turf. Also, have a planned for what happens if the half elf success. Which can and should be a very possible outcome!
Good luck my friend! Hope it works out! ^^
Mind Flayers are a fun villian to throw in. Though they can be tough so you would want to either wait until the players are stong enough or dumb down it's stats.
-Sol