So, I'm thinking about running a campaign once the one I'm currently in is over (even though it'll take a while before that point), and I went ahead and made a boss monster. If anyone more experienced would like to give some feedback on my boss monster, that would be most appreciated. I'm not sure if I can link to the info page so here's the basic rundown: the boss is a gargantuan red dragon that is a 12th level spell caster. The dragon has acid splash, magic missile, mirror image, slow, greater invisibility, cone of cold, and sunbeam. He does not have frightful presence or legendary actions, because at the time of writing him I thought he didn't need them with spells. He also has no lair actions since its a basic cave, and they'd fight him in the open anyway. His breath weapon, instead of a 60-foot cone of fire, is a 70-foot cone of fire. He still has the legendary resistance trait that red dragons normally have. All his other attacks are the same as an adult red dragon, with the same damage rolls. Like I implied before, I'm very new to homebrewing for this game, so any feedback on this monster would be appreciated.
I think you should reconsider the removal of legendary and lair actions. The main problem with a solo fight is that you get one turn and then your party gets ALL of their turns. Not only do these mechanics give you a chance to stop a series of events that can end up with you dying in one turn, they also give the battle a sense of scale and importance that feels fitting for a big, climactic fight.
I would also think about what you're trying to accomplish with the spells. Cone of Cold is just an off-brand breath, as is Sunbeam (which isn't going to last more than 1 turn with everyone beating on you). Those spells aren't really giving you a different option than what you already have. Greater Invisibility is potentially very good, but you can get into a weird situation where the smart thing would just be for you to fly around invisibly until your breath recharges, breathe and repeat until the party is dead. So you inevitably end up making up some reason the intelligent, resourceful dragon decides to forgo the smart thing and behave in a way that makes it beatable.
If you get a chance, pay attention to any solo fights you may encounter in your current game. Look at what worked well and what didn't. It's not just about balancing the amount of damage you can give and receive; it's about creating an experience. Think about what your turns will feel like, think about what a good party can throw at you, and give yourself some tools to handle different situations but not tools that are so good that the party can only win if you allow them to.
Thank you, I went ahead and reversed the "no legendary actions and lair actions" thing and changed some spells around. I'm still trying to think of a logical reason why he wouldn't just fly constantly. That's the problem of trying to make a flying creature. So far I have him in a 40 by 40 room where he can't fly to his full capacity, as well as him not being at his full mental faculties during the fight due to a cursed artifact that is part of his treasure trove.
The issue of "why wouldn't it just fly all the time" is often why it's best to fight a dragon in a lair; they are highly territorial and a lair typically includes a hoard that the dragon is not going to willingly give up, but on the other hand the lair will usually limit how much they can fly around.
If you want to have a dragon battle in the open then the best way to run it is going to be with the ability to damage the dragon's wings; i.e- once the dragon takes a certain amount of damage it's forced to the ground. If you're going to have NPCs nearby then you might consider having them do something that brings it down while the players fight, in case the players don't think of something for themselves, e.g- if it's a large enough town maybe the guards would have access to some form of ballista? Or a retired adventurer has a magic bow? Or a priest calls upon their deity to intervene with a bolt of lightning? You'll need something to explain why it's not just going to use its breath attack then fly off until it recharges before strafing again. Once downed I'd maybe still let it "swoop" so it still has the extra speed, but it just can't fly away anymore.
As for spells, the first thing to consider is that dragons don't usually need much in the way of help when it comes to dealing damage, so damage spells often don't make a lot of sense as you're not normally going to beat the raw physical damage or the breath weapon. For this same reason you may not want too many spells that require an action, as there is rarely going to be a time when acid splash is a better option than Multiattack.
You've got some interesting choices for buffs/debuffs; slow is a solid option for an opener. Greater invisibility is a nasty one for added defence. Mirror image I'm less sure about since it takes your turn, and a dragon will have so much incoming fire the mirrors won't last very long. To be honest the first two as single use spells already makes the fight more difficult.
Otherwise I guess the key question is what you want from the spellcasting; is it about having more elemental attacks and having other elements to work with? In that case fireball and lightning bolt could be a good combo if you want it to be able to use fire more while waiting for a recharge, and also bypass resistance using lightning (which is still a form of energy somewhat related to fire)?
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
I am a big fan of "phases" for epic boss fights, so an initial phase where it flies followed by a ground phase when the wings have been damaged could be a good solution.
Last time our party fought a dragon, a player was desperate to get the dragon's attention off the rest of the party so they could recover a bit, so he started literally attacking the dragon's hoard. Grabbing an item and running off to a more restricted area could work as well. Greed and arrogance are usually the weak points of dragons, so pushing those buttons can often get them to do irrational things. Your curse idea is a good one too - you could make that curse as debilitating as you need it to be.
My advice is don't worry about spell casting rules that much.Think about how and when you are going to use spells and consider integrating them into abilities to make the game play easier and to avoid having unused spells. Additionally if they are abilities you can change things like concentration and damage type.
Phases
Consider using an mythic trait which is when they take a certain amount of damage they trigger a change, regain some health an gain new moves.
Concentration
For example right now there are allot of concentration spells that can't be used simultaneously, wall of stone, greater invisibility, eye bite slow. You've got two phases flying and ground and your probably only need one concentration spell for each.
Flying
Lightning vulnerability worries me, losing flight is devastating as is double damage, a single lightning bolt will likely take him down with an average 56 damage if he fails his save. He will then take fall damage. You are likely to have you fight start off with your players just straight up shooting them out of the sky. That's potentially cool but obviously that isn't a multi phase fight really, or at least the first phase is very short.
Probably pick one of the following:
wall of fire as like leaving a trail of breath for flame. He casts it when ever he uses his breath weapon.
A dragon curse like effect using eyebite or slow. This may also fit as a lair action or something that just happens around him.
Terrain control wall of stone. This would show his mastery over the terrain and could also work as a terrain action. Its also semi covered by one of the lair action you have with the collapsing room. Another good spell for a similar feel is bones of the earth
Ground
Pick one of the following:
Aura of smoke shadow of moil, incendiary cloud or fog cloud. Gives obscurement for defense and shadow of moil/ incediary cloud also give additional damage. This could also just be an aura he has
A dragon curse like effect using eyebite or slow. This may also fit as a lair action or something that just happens around him.
Terrain control wall of stone. This would show his mastery over the terrain and could also work as a terrain action. Its also semi covered by one of the lair action you have with the collapsing room. Another good spell for a similar feel is bones of the earth
Other abilities
lightning weakness/ countering magic
Another cool ability is perhaps dispel magic with the caveat he only uses it to dispel magical clouds. I just like the image of a druid conjuring a storm and a dragon burning it away with it's fire breath. Unlike counter spell dispel magic still allows it to take effect but stops a single spell being too powerful against a dragon.
Offensive magic
Currently his own offensive spell is [spell]flame strike[spell] on average this will not contribute very much to his damage as realistically burns this in the first couple of rounds and it's gone. I don't think it's very impactful and so is just another resource to track. With a once off go big or go home, make it a big telegraphed attack that makes them think" oh no we've got to block or avoid this" or make it something that happens a couple of times so it's part of what he does and they can learn to adapt to it.
meteor swarm would be my choice for the big telegraphed attack.
fireball or flame strike would be occasional spells. 3 uses is a good number so maybe one round they do it with a legendary action at the end of ever persons turn, or maybe when ever they can't fire breath they use it.
Ok, I added some mythic stuff when he can't fly, and raised the hp threshold for that to happen. I also upped his average HP a bit. I actually originally planned to give him Meteor Swarm as a move granted by the crown on his head, but I figured the PCs wouldn't survive a 40d6. https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/2469551-dragon-emperor-za-chien
Edit: It's balanced as a Cr 21 if you run both mythic forms I really should make a version that's more traditionally mythic. Which is Cr 21 with 1 form and 2 Cr 21 encounters with both.
So, I'm thinking about running a campaign once the one I'm currently in is over (even though it'll take a while before that point), and I went ahead and made a boss monster. If anyone more experienced would like to give some feedback on my boss monster, that would be most appreciated. I'm not sure if I can link to the info page so here's the basic rundown: the boss is a gargantuan red dragon that is a 12th level spell caster. The dragon has acid splash, magic missile, mirror image, slow, greater invisibility, cone of cold, and sunbeam. He does not have frightful presence or legendary actions, because at the time of writing him I thought he didn't need them with spells. He also has no lair actions since its a basic cave, and they'd fight him in the open anyway. His breath weapon, instead of a 60-foot cone of fire, is a 70-foot cone of fire. He still has the legendary resistance trait that red dragons normally have. All his other attacks are the same as an adult red dragon, with the same damage rolls. Like I implied before, I'm very new to homebrewing for this game, so any feedback on this monster would be appreciated.
I think you should reconsider the removal of legendary and lair actions. The main problem with a solo fight is that you get one turn and then your party gets ALL of their turns. Not only do these mechanics give you a chance to stop a series of events that can end up with you dying in one turn, they also give the battle a sense of scale and importance that feels fitting for a big, climactic fight.
I would also think about what you're trying to accomplish with the spells. Cone of Cold is just an off-brand breath, as is Sunbeam (which isn't going to last more than 1 turn with everyone beating on you). Those spells aren't really giving you a different option than what you already have. Greater Invisibility is potentially very good, but you can get into a weird situation where the smart thing would just be for you to fly around invisibly until your breath recharges, breathe and repeat until the party is dead. So you inevitably end up making up some reason the intelligent, resourceful dragon decides to forgo the smart thing and behave in a way that makes it beatable.
If you get a chance, pay attention to any solo fights you may encounter in your current game. Look at what worked well and what didn't. It's not just about balancing the amount of damage you can give and receive; it's about creating an experience. Think about what your turns will feel like, think about what a good party can throw at you, and give yourself some tools to handle different situations but not tools that are so good that the party can only win if you allow them to.
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
Thank you, I went ahead and reversed the "no legendary actions and lair actions" thing and changed some spells around. I'm still trying to think of a logical reason why he wouldn't just fly constantly. That's the problem of trying to make a flying creature. So far I have him in a 40 by 40 room where he can't fly to his full capacity, as well as him not being at his full mental faculties during the fight due to a cursed artifact that is part of his treasure trove.
The issue of "why wouldn't it just fly all the time" is often why it's best to fight a dragon in a lair; they are highly territorial and a lair typically includes a hoard that the dragon is not going to willingly give up, but on the other hand the lair will usually limit how much they can fly around.
If you want to have a dragon battle in the open then the best way to run it is going to be with the ability to damage the dragon's wings; i.e- once the dragon takes a certain amount of damage it's forced to the ground. If you're going to have NPCs nearby then you might consider having them do something that brings it down while the players fight, in case the players don't think of something for themselves, e.g- if it's a large enough town maybe the guards would have access to some form of ballista? Or a retired adventurer has a magic bow? Or a priest calls upon their deity to intervene with a bolt of lightning? You'll need something to explain why it's not just going to use its breath attack then fly off until it recharges before strafing again. Once downed I'd maybe still let it "swoop" so it still has the extra speed, but it just can't fly away anymore.
As for spells, the first thing to consider is that dragons don't usually need much in the way of help when it comes to dealing damage, so damage spells often don't make a lot of sense as you're not normally going to beat the raw physical damage or the breath weapon. For this same reason you may not want too many spells that require an action, as there is rarely going to be a time when acid splash is a better option than Multiattack.
You've got some interesting choices for buffs/debuffs; slow is a solid option for an opener. Greater invisibility is a nasty one for added defence. Mirror image I'm less sure about since it takes your turn, and a dragon will have so much incoming fire the mirrors won't last very long. To be honest the first two as single use spells already makes the fight more difficult.
Otherwise I guess the key question is what you want from the spellcasting; is it about having more elemental attacks and having other elements to work with? In that case fireball and lightning bolt could be a good combo if you want it to be able to use fire more while waiting for a recharge, and also bypass resistance using lightning (which is still a form of energy somewhat related to fire)?
Just some thoughts; it's tricky to balance!
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
I am a big fan of "phases" for epic boss fights, so an initial phase where it flies followed by a ground phase when the wings have been damaged could be a good solution.
Last time our party fought a dragon, a player was desperate to get the dragon's attention off the rest of the party so they could recover a bit, so he started literally attacking the dragon's hoard. Grabbing an item and running off to a more restricted area could work as well. Greed and arrogance are usually the weak points of dragons, so pushing those buttons can often get them to do irrational things. Your curse idea is a good one too - you could make that curse as debilitating as you need it to be.
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
Right, so I added some things to him and upped his challenge rating a bit. Let me know if the new challenge rating is fitting or not, I might have given it too low a rating: https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/2467850-dragon-emperor-za-chien
My advice is don't worry about spell casting rules that much.Think about how and when you are going to use spells and consider integrating them into abilities to make the game play easier and to avoid having unused spells. Additionally if they are abilities you can change things like concentration and damage type.
Phases
Consider using an mythic trait which is when they take a certain amount of damage they trigger a change, regain some health an gain new moves.
Concentration
For example right now there are allot of concentration spells that can't be used simultaneously, wall of stone, greater invisibility, eye bite slow. You've got two phases flying and ground and your probably only need one concentration spell for each.
Flying
Lightning vulnerability worries me, losing flight is devastating as is double damage, a single lightning bolt will likely take him down with an average 56 damage if he fails his save. He will then take fall damage. You are likely to have you fight start off with your players just straight up shooting them out of the sky. That's potentially cool but obviously that isn't a multi phase fight really, or at least the first phase is very short.
Probably pick one of the following:
Ground
Pick one of the following:
Other abilities
lightning weakness/ countering magic
Another cool ability is perhaps dispel magic with the caveat he only uses it to dispel magical clouds. I just like the image of a druid conjuring a storm and a dragon burning it away with it's fire breath. Unlike counter spell dispel magic still allows it to take effect but stops a single spell being too powerful against a dragon.
Offensive magic
Currently his own offensive spell is [spell]flame strike[spell] on average this will not contribute very much to his damage as realistically burns this in the first couple of rounds and it's gone. I don't think it's very impactful and so is just another resource to track. With a once off go big or go home, make it a big telegraphed attack that makes them think" oh no we've got to block or avoid this" or make it something that happens a couple of times so it's part of what he does and they can learn to adapt to it.
meteor swarm would be my choice for the big telegraphed attack.
fireball or flame strike would be occasional spells. 3 uses is a good number so maybe one round they do it with a legendary action at the end of ever persons turn, or maybe when ever they can't fire breath they use it.
Ok, I added some mythic stuff when he can't fly, and raised the hp threshold for that to happen. I also upped his average HP a bit. I actually originally planned to give him Meteor Swarm as a move granted by the crown on his head, but I figured the PCs wouldn't survive a 40d6. https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/2469551-dragon-emperor-za-chien
Got bored and made an example dragon. It's a volcano dragon named after karaka toa.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/2469325-kralka-toric-dragon-of-the-burning-mt
Edit: It's balanced as a Cr 21 if you run both mythic forms I really should make a version that's more traditionally mythic. Which is Cr 21 with 1 form and 2 Cr 21 encounters with both.
Okay, I ended up adding some regional effects to add some flavor. https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/2469652-dragon-emperor-za-chien
At this point, I'm just going to say screw it and give him meteor swarm.