Hi, I'm making a one shot game for my friends that are interested in dnd and need help finding a monster that is native to forests. I want it to be like the spirit of the woods of the area. This spirit would need to be something that is either neutral or evil, since it needs to eat children in order for the land to thrive. I'll have 4-5 players so I would need to adjust the challenge rating accordingly. I've looked through the monster manual for 5e and nothing really stuck out to me. I'm not sure how to homebrew a monster and keep it at a good challenge rating. Any advice on how to do that or if there might be a monster in other books that might fit? I would really appreciate it! Thanks.
The easiest way to homebrew a monster and keep it at the right challenge rating is to reflavor an existing monster. Pick a monster of generally the right CR and the right kind of enemy (is it fast and flying? or slow and has lots of HP? a caster?) and then swich around the description of the monster and of its attacks, possibly switch around its damage types.
I often get inspiration from art. I suggest doing a search for "Forest Monster" or something similar and using that as a starting point. It's a good way to determine things like the size of the creature, whether it is bipedal, what natural weapons it has etc. I recently used a corrupted Wood Woad for a level 3 party as part of a side-quest.
What level is your party? if they are very low level you could use an awakened tree, ettercap or a dryad that has been corrupted by some unknown evil (to make the good/neutral ones evil). at slightly higher level you could use a band of Gnolls, and at moderate levels you could use a treant that has been corrupted.
Since it’s a a spirit of the woods I would definitely use a Treant! And I would scale it up or down in power to match the PCs. Maybe give it some dryads or nymphs or satyrs or something similar as allies to add flavor and fun.
I would add a story where they were all corrupted by something evil, maybe an ancient evil is in the middle of the woods and it’s power is corrupting the normally neutral and good inhabitants of the forest and the goal is to find and purify the evil to free the forest from its grasp and return it to normal?
Hi, I'm making a one shot game for my friends that are interested in dnd and need help finding a monster that is native to forests. I want it to be like the spirit of the woods of the area. This spirit would need to be something that is either neutral or evil, since it needs to eat children in order for the land to thrive. I'll have 4-5 players so I would need to adjust the challenge rating accordingly. I've looked through the monster manual for 5e and nothing really stuck out to me. I'm not sure how to homebrew a monster and keep it at a good challenge rating. Any advice on how to do that or if there might be a monster in other books that might fit? I would really appreciate it! Thanks.
There aren't any super appropriate creatures of the right challenge (about CR 8, assuming there are a few encounters before reaching it); you could use a Young Green Dragon or a Treant but neither feels all that amazing, so I'd probably custom brew something. Maybe a mid-high level druid (around 13-14).
You mentioned that you want it to be a sort of spirit of the forest. How about this as an idea. The creature first appears as a beautiful, serene dryad/fairy/pixie. (I envision a sort of forest nymph that holds a very innocent child like appearance with a faint green iridescent glow about them.) It is in this form that the creature will talk, make deals, etc. When it is time to consume a child to feed the power which keeps the forest safe, it shifts its appearance to another form, liken to that of a hag albeit large, and with a dislocating separating jaw that splits into 3 separate parts to eat the child, body and spirit, absorbing its essence and power. After feasting, it returns to the beautiful child like appearance mentioned before. During combat, it shifts to the shape that is best suited for the desired task (flying as a fairy or pixie, running as the innocent child like appearance albeit unnaturally fast, physical attacks as the hag like creature, while spell casting could be from any form it takes.) If the combat will be against the one creature, you should scale it's HP to be able to take the damage of at least 3 rounds of combat from the party. Figure out the max damage the party can do in a single round, and give the HP of the beast 3 rounds of that amount of damage. At level 6, that could be anywhere from 400 HP and up. If the monster will have minions in the fight, then the total HP should scale accordingly.
I would say a creature like this would have a I would say that a creature like this would have a high charisma score, adept at deception, high wisdom or intelligence, low to medium dex. Low to medium strength. And depending on which stat you give a high number, (wisdom or intelligence) I would make the other between 10 and 12 to give a +1 modifier.
I would give it immunity to charm, and resistance perhaps to one or 2 magic types.
The sky is the limit on such homebrew creations. :) in any case, have fun.
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Hi, I'm making a one shot game for my friends that are interested in dnd and need help finding a monster that is native to forests. I want it to be like the spirit of the woods of the area. This spirit would need to be something that is either neutral or evil, since it needs to eat children in order for the land to thrive. I'll have 4-5 players so I would need to adjust the challenge rating accordingly. I've looked through the monster manual for 5e and nothing really stuck out to me. I'm not sure how to homebrew a monster and keep it at a good challenge rating. Any advice on how to do that or if there might be a monster in other books that might fit? I would really appreciate it! Thanks.
The easiest way to homebrew a monster and keep it at the right challenge rating is to reflavor an existing monster. Pick a monster of generally the right CR and the right kind of enemy (is it fast and flying? or slow and has lots of HP? a caster?) and then swich around the description of the monster and of its attacks, possibly switch around its damage types.
I often get inspiration from art. I suggest doing a search for "Forest Monster" or something similar and using that as a starting point. It's a good way to determine things like the size of the creature, whether it is bipedal, what natural weapons it has etc. I recently used a corrupted Wood Woad for a level 3 party as part of a side-quest.
What level is your party? if they are very low level you could use an awakened tree, ettercap or a dryad that has been corrupted by some unknown evil (to make the good/neutral ones evil). at slightly higher level you could use a band of Gnolls, and at moderate levels you could use a treant that has been corrupted.
Check out the various hags. They can easily be re-skinned to make the level appropriate version fit your setting.
Since it’s a a spirit of the woods I would definitely use a Treant! And I would scale it up or down in power to match the PCs. Maybe give it some dryads or nymphs or satyrs or something similar as allies to add flavor and fun.
I would add a story where they were all corrupted by something evil, maybe an ancient evil is in the middle of the woods and it’s power is corrupting the normally neutral and good inhabitants of the forest and the goal is to find and purify the evil to free the forest from its grasp and return it to normal?
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There aren't any super appropriate creatures of the right challenge (about CR 8, assuming there are a few encounters before reaching it); you could use a Young Green Dragon or a Treant but neither feels all that amazing, so I'd probably custom brew something. Maybe a mid-high level druid (around 13-14).
The party will be level 6 by the time they get there. Thanks for the suggestions!
You mentioned that you want it to be a sort of spirit of the forest. How about this as an idea.
The creature first appears as a beautiful, serene dryad/fairy/pixie. (I envision a sort of forest nymph that holds a very innocent child like appearance with a faint green iridescent glow about them.) It is in this form that the creature will talk, make deals, etc.
When it is time to consume a child to feed the power which keeps the forest safe, it shifts its appearance to another form, liken to that of a hag albeit large, and with a dislocating separating jaw that splits into 3 separate parts to eat the child, body and spirit, absorbing its essence and power. After feasting, it returns to the beautiful child like appearance mentioned before.
During combat, it shifts to the shape that is best suited for the desired task (flying as a fairy or pixie, running as the innocent child like appearance albeit unnaturally fast, physical attacks as the hag like creature, while spell casting could be from any form it takes.) If the combat will be against the one creature, you should scale it's HP to be able to take the damage of at least 3 rounds of combat from the party. Figure out the max damage the party can do in a single round, and give the HP of the beast 3 rounds of that amount of damage. At level 6, that could be anywhere from 400 HP and up. If the monster will have minions in the fight, then the total HP should scale accordingly.
I would say a creature like this would have a I would say that a creature like this would have a high charisma score, adept at deception, high wisdom or intelligence, low to medium dex. Low to medium strength. And depending on which stat you give a high number, (wisdom or intelligence) I would make the other between 10 and 12 to give a +1 modifier.
I would give it immunity to charm, and resistance perhaps to one or 2 magic types.
The sky is the limit on such homebrew creations. :) in any case, have fun.
You can lead a dwarf to water, but you can't make him get in the boat.