[peach] So I'm trying to take the Devourer from 3.5e to 5e and I want feedback

[ShamasTheBard]

So this beastie is keeping it's CR 11 status and I'm giving it a 21 AC, 203 HP, a Proficiency bonus of 4, a bonus to hit of +13 (4 prof. bonus, 28 strength) 60 damage per round, and a save DC of 18 (explain the need for that in a minute)
It's 60 damage per round is broken up into three attacks, two claws and a bite:

claw attack: +13 to hit, 20 (2d10+9) Slashing damage
bite attack: +13 to hit, 20 (2d10+9) Piercing damage

Now the real meat and potatoes that made the devourer interesting in 3.5 was what happened when it shoved someone in their chest. Instead of doing negative levels to someone (because to vecna with all that) I'm actually going to have the devourer consume the targets hit dice and deal them levels of exhaustion.

Devour: If the Devourer makes a successful grapple against a medium sized or smaller target, the Devourer inserts and engulfs the target in their chest tiny spectral and mummified hands restrain and blind the target inside the Devourers chest, sapping the life energy from the target in the process. On the start of the devoured creatures turns, hey must make a DC 18 constitution saving throw. On a failure, the Devourer saps 1d4 hit dice from the target, allowing the Devourer to use those hit dice to heal it's self or use them to refund the cost of it's spells with the level of the spell regained equal to the amount of hit dice sapped, and the devoured target gains a level of exhaustion. If the target passes the saving throw, it does not gain a level of exhaustion, but still loses 14 hit dice. If the devoured target deals 30 damage to the Devourer in a single round, it forces the devourer to make a DC (?) Constitution saving throw or regurgitate the devoured target. The Devourer can only devour one target at once.

So would you say the Devour ability is too strong or too harsh? Should I change it? I didn't want to make it do damage or else I would need to change up the actual damage it does per round with it's attacks. I don't know what spells it will have just yet but I definitely want to give it Enlarge/Reduce, Expeditious Retreat, Silence, Invisibility, and Hold person. I think those are enough though.

[recapdrake]

Maybe drop the negative hit points, It feels like exhaustion was built to be the neg level replacement.

[Forum Explorer]

So this beastie is keeping it's CR 11 status and I'm giving it a 21 AC, 203 HP, a Proficiency bonus of 4, a bonus to hit of +13 (4 prof. bonus, 28 strength) 60 damage per round, and a save DC of 18 (explain the need for that in a minute)
It's 60 damage per round is broken up into three attacks, two claws and a bite:

claw attack: +13 to hit, 20 (2d10+9) Slashing damage
bite attack: +13 to hit, 20 (2d10+9) Piercing damage

Now the real meat and potatoes that made the devourer interesting in 3.5 was what happened when it shoved someone in their chest. Instead of doing negative levels to someone (because to vecna with all that) I'm actually going to have the devourer consume the targets hit dice and deal them levels of exhaustion.

Devour: If the Devourer makes a successful grapple against a medium sized or smaller target, the Devourer inserts and engulfs the target in their chest tiny spectral and mummified hands restrain and blind the target inside the Devourers chest, sapping the life energy from the target in the process. On the start of the devoured creatures turns, hey must make a DC 18 constitution saving throw. On a failure, the Devourer saps 1d4 hit dice from the target, allowing the Devourer to use those hit dice to heal it's self or use them to refund the cost of it's spells with the level of the spell regained equal to the amount of hit dice sapped, and the devoured target gains a level of exhaustion. If the target passes the saving throw, it does not gain a level of exhaustion, but still loses 14 hit dice. If the devoured target deals 30 damage to the Devourer in a single round, it forces the devourer to make a DC (?) Constitution saving throw or regurgitate the devoured target. The Devourer can only devour one target at once.

So would you say the Devour ability is too strong or too harsh? Should I change it? I didn't want to make it do damage or else I would need to change up the actual damage it does per round with it's attacks. I don't know what spells it will have just yet but I definitely want to give it Enlarge/Reduce, Expeditious Retreat, Silence, Invisibility, and Hold person. I think those are enough though.

I'd say you are way above CR 11. From the AC and Attack Bonus alone, I'd put it at a challenge rating of 15. Then you add in extra abilities, and extra spells. So yeah, it's not too strong, but I wouldn't say that it's a challenge rating 11 creature.

Though the ability isn't that over powered, so I would peg it at a CR 15 creature.

[ShamasTheBard]

I'd say you are way above CR 11. From the AC and Attack Bonus alone, I'd put it at a challenge rating of 15. Then you add in extra abilities, and extra spells. So yeah, it's not too strong, but I wouldn't say that it's a challenge rating 11 creature.

Though the ability isn't that over powered, so I would peg it at a CR 15 creature.

I was using the rules in the DMG for making monsters from scratch.

Basic CR 11 monster stats:
Prof. Bonus: 4
AC: 17
HP: 221-235
Hit bonus: 8
Damage per round: 69-74
Save DC: 17

Using the rules in the dmg, for every two points you raise in AC, increase the defensive CR of the monster by 1.

CR: 11 AC 17 +6 = 21, makes it defensive CR 14. Reduce the HP by 3 CR to get proper HP = (whoops) puts it in the CR 8 176-190 range, which barely makes me get away with having a defensive CR of 11, considering the AC for CR * monsters is 16. Maybe I'll reduce the AC to 20 instead. The players are level 11 at this point and most of them have a +9 to hit right now.

For offensive CR the chart shows: +8 hit bonus, 17 DC, and 69-74 DPR. 8+5=13 hit bonus which increases offensive CR to 13. Drop the damage by two steps to CR 9 which is between the 57-62 range. Though the hit bonus for the chart at CR 9 is +7, so I will probably drop the strength to 26, which makes a +12 to hit instead and reduces the damage per round to 57, which is still within the range I need.

Am I missing something or doing something wrong here?

[ShamasTheBard]

Maybe drop the negative hit points, It feels like exhaustion was built to be the neg level replacement.

Being devoured doesn't reduce hit points or the hit point maximum, it just steals Hit Dice which can be spent during a short rest to heal. I figure making the attacks reduce hit point maximums with such a high hit bonus may be a jerk move, even though giving it that ability won't affect CR as described in the DMG.

[Forum Explorer]

I was using the rules in the DMG for making monsters from scratch.

Basic CR 11 monster stats:
Prof. Bonus: 4
AC: 17
HP: 221-235
Hit bonus: 8
Damage per round: 69-74
Save DC: 17

Using the rules in the dmg, for every two points you raise in AC, increase the defensive CR of the monster by 1.

CR: 11 AC 17 +6 = 21, makes it defensive CR 14. Reduce the HP by 3 CR to get proper HP = (whoops) puts it in the CR 8 176-190 range, which barely makes me get away with having a defensive CR of 11, considering the AC for CR * monsters is 16. Maybe I'll reduce the AC to 20 instead. The players are level 11 at this point and most of them have a +9 to hit right now.

For offensive CR the chart shows: +8 hit bonus, 17 DC, and 69-74 DPR. 8+5=13 hit bonus which increases offensive CR to 13. Drop the damage by two steps to CR 9 which is between the 57-62 range. Though the hit bonus for the chart at CR 9 is +7, so I will probably drop the strength to 26, which makes a +12 to hit instead and reduces the damage per round to 57, which is still within the range I need.

Am I missing something or doing something wrong here?

The table is a little borked, it underestimates the effects of AC in comparison to HP, and higher to hit bonus. Particularly in regards to bounded accuracy where having a high AC has a much bigger i In your case you've set the AC to higher then an ancient brass dragon.

I mean, look at how slowly AC rises on the table. For every 60 HP the AC will increase by 1. And yet for calculating how much harder AC makes the fight, you only increase it by 1 row (or 15 HP) for every 2 points which is just silly IMO.

[Firechanter]

Yeah, high AC is _poison_ for the game. 5E monsters are supposed to be (relatively) easy to hit. What you are doing is that you minmax the CR system to make a CR11 monster as deadly as possible, by exchanging things that are okay-ish against things that are grossly underrated by the design guidelines. That's not how you are supposed to use it.

Just compare your monster to various other monsters in the MM and see how the CR compares.

Likewise, the Hit Bonus is supposed to already _include_ the Proficiency Bonus. Again, look at other CR11 monsters and their To Hits: Horned Devil +10, Behir +10, Djinni +9 -- etc. etc., all are around +10.

I haven't begun evaluating the special ability yet, but the To Hit and AC are more in the region of CR20+, so I suggest you fix that first. A Solar has AC21 and +13 To Hit, and that's a CR21!

[ShamasTheBard]

Yeah I'm starting to see what you guys are saying now. I think sticking with a 19 AC and +9-10 hit bonus is a much better idea. I'll just up the HP to make up for it because I like where it's damage per turn is at. Maybe give it immunities and resistances so I don't just have a massive HP for the thing. The resistances and immunities make more sense thematically anyways. Maybe give it undead fortitude.

I mean I'll admit my dirty little secret here. I let my players roll for their stats. I let them break the game harder than I ever thought could happen because I went from 3.5e to 5e without much experience in 5e. I really underestimated just how much of a drastic change it was between the two editions. I did that because I was really excited about 5e because holy crap, monks and fighters are cool now and I wanted a group NOW. So, that's why I kind of min maxed this thing a little bit like a derpasaurous, and I fell into the trap of DM vs Players.

[eastmabl]

Devour: If the Devourer makes a successful grapple against a medium sized or smaller target, the Devourer inserts and engulfs the target in their chest tiny spectral and mummified hands restrain and blind the target inside the Devourer's chest, sapping the life energy from the target in the process. On the start of the devoured creatures turns, hey must make a DC 18 constitution saving throw. On a failure, the Devourer saps 1d4 hit dice from the target, allowing the Devourer to use those hit dice to heal itself or use them to refund the cost of its spells with the level of the spell regained equal to the amount of hit dice sapped, and the devoured target gains a level of exhaustion. If the target passes the saving throw, it does not gain a level of exhaustion, but still loses 1[d]4 hit dice. If the devoured target deals 30 damage to the Devourer in a single round, it forces the devourer to make a DC (?) Constitution saving throw or regurgitate the devoured target. The Devourer can only devour one target at once.

I've made some minor changes to your description - I'm assuming that one does not lose 14 HD by passing a save.

Hit Dice Eater

While it's a cool idea to have the devourer eat HD, I think that it's absolutely murderous on a continued adventuring day. HD are one of the things that there is no way to regenerate except by natural rest. Conceivably, a character that gets devoured and cannot do 30 HP of damage in a round is going to wind up

You're probably better off using some kind of life drain that lowers the affected creature's HP (see the wight ability).

Also, keeping in line with 5e's general guideline of player agency, you should give the player an opportunity to try to escape the devourer.

Regurgitation

Especially if you are going to let it eat HD, you shouldn't give the devourer a saving throw to avoid regurgitating the target - just give it to the player.

My re-write of the ability:




Devour: If the Devourer makes a successful grapple against a medium sized or smaller target, the Devourer inserts and engulfs the target in their chest. While inside its chest, tiny spectral and mummified hands restrain and bind the target, sapping the life energy from the target in the process. On the start of its turn, the target takes 16 (3d8) HP of necrotic damage which heals the Devourer. The devoured creature must succeed on a Constitution Saving Throw DC 18 or its hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the damage taken. This reduction lasts until the target finishes a long rest. The devoured creature dies if this effect reduces its hit point maximum to 0.

While devoured, the target can use an action to attempt to escape the grapple in the Devourer's chest (DC 18). Alternatively, if the target deals 30 damage to the Devourer in a single round, the Devourer will regurgitate the target, and the target is no longer considered devoured.

The Devourer can only devour one target at once.

[Forum Explorer]

Yeah I'm starting to see what you guys are saying now. I think sticking with a 19 AC and +9-10 hit bonus is a much better idea. I'll just up the HP to make up for it because I like where it's damage per turn is at. Maybe give it immunities and resistances so I don't just have a massive HP for the thing. The resistances and immunities make more sense thematically anyways. Maybe give it undead fortitude.

I mean I'll admit my dirty little secret here. I let my players roll for their stats. I let them break the game harder than I ever thought could happen because I went from 3.5e to 5e without much experience in 5e. I really underestimated just how much of a drastic change it was between the two editions. I did that because I was really excited about 5e because holy crap, monks and fighters are cool now and I wanted a group NOW. So, that's why I kind of min maxed this thing a little bit like a derpasaurous, and I fell into the trap of DM vs Players.

That is a lot better.


Now that is surprising. How have your players broken the game?

[CNagy]

Now that is surprising. How have your players broken the game?

I'm assuming the game breakage came from rolling for stats. Rolling high for stats turns the game super feat-heavy, since you no longer have to weigh getting that +1 attack bonus against grabbing a feat instead.

This topic comes up every now and again when we argue about the RAW on ability stat generation. People argue that it does break the game, people argue that it doesn't break the game, no one agrees on anything. But the fact remains that rolling high on stats (and, given that people love to roll and they love to win, rolling super high on stats) changes how you approach the game, because no one is going to raise a tertiary stat when they could grab Resilience, or whatever flavor of attack feat suits them best, or Tough, or what have you.

[Forum Explorer]

I'm assuming the game breakage came from rolling for stats. Rolling high for stats turns the game super feat-heavy, since you no longer have to weigh getting that +1 attack bonus against grabbing a feat instead.

This topic comes up every now and again when we argue about the RAW on ability stat generation. People argue that it does break the game, people argue that it doesn't break the game, no one agrees on anything. But the fact remains that rolling high on stats (and, given that people love to roll and they love to win, rolling super high on stats) changes how you approach the game, because no one is going to raise a tertiary stat when they could grab Resilience, or whatever flavor of attack feat suits them best, or Tough, or what have you.

I let my players roll for stats. I like the variety it gives between stat blocks, and I've never had a problem with challenging my players. If anything they need that little bit of a boost to handle the fights I throw at them.

[CNagy]

I let my players roll for stats. I like the variety it gives between stat blocks, and I've never had a problem with challenging my players. If anything they need that little bit of a boost to handle the fights I throw at them.

Like most internet fights, both sides tend to exaggerate to make their point. Does it ruin the game? Nah, it's not that dire. But it does skew the power curve in a way that needs to be accounted for when creating encounters, and if you don't then the game can feel like a cakewalk. A CR4 encounter isn't counting on characters with +7s to hit and access to combat feats, for example, let alone a Hunter Ranger with +9 to hit and the Sharpshooter feat. By the end of the game, it makes much less of a difference (only so many great feats for any one character build), but in early and middle levels having that maxed stat and those extra feats can be hugely helpful for the players and hugely disruptive for a DM who goes by the book on CR.

All that said, I don't let my players roll. It's easier to give stuff than it is to take it away; and I can give things in the form of unique encounters, strange artifacts, etc. Found a nymph's pool? Take a soak and find your Charisma increased by two (but not the cap.) Lesser Tomes and Manuals, encounters with supernatural and otherworldly beings--in the end, stat points can become a sort of treasure, in my opinion, though your ability to hand out such treasure diminishes if players are allowed to roll their typically-much-higher-than-standard-array rolls.

[Hawkstar]

Things that dealt negative levels in prior editions now merely reduce maximum HP.

[ShamasTheBard]

Things that dealt negative levels in prior editions now merely reduce maximum HP.

Okay, I wasn't totally sure if that was how they carried things over, thank you. Do you think the concept of giving them levels of exhaustion is cool or too harsh?

[ShamasTheBard]

That is a lot better.


Now that is surprising. How have your players broken the game?

Well the monk has a 20 in both Wisdom and Dex at level 9, so there's that.