For the Skorne!

[ZenBear]

I’m a big fan of the tabletop war game Warmachine, and one of my favorite factions is the Skorne!
http://battlecollege.org/index.php/Skorne
I’m wondering if anyone has seen home brew monsters made for some of the war beasts in Warmachine/Horde, or have tips for me to home brew them myself?

[JNAProductions]

At work. But subbing to this thread-I like making monsters

[ZenBear]

At work. But subbing to this thread-I like making monsters

Glad for the interest, I love your home brew!

I want to work on the Skorne specifically because I’m including them in my campaign setting. I’ve taken the map of Westeros and managed to fit pretty much every known player race and a wide variety of monsters into the various regions. The Skorne will be in the Dornish lands, in this case a Tiefling empire ruled by Devils. Essentially all of the Immortals/Undead of the Skorne faction will be replaced by Fiends. The sadistic, militaristic style fits a Fiendish empire perfectly. The priority for home brewing would be the Titans, Agonizers and Paingivers.

[alchahest]

I'd start with Volo's Hobgoblins as a base.

Keep Saving Face and Martial Training,

Drop Darkvision and add the following:

Desertborn: Advantage on saves to resist exhaustion from heat and cold. requires half as much water as normal.

Ancestral Soul: gain proficiency in History, and you may add your Int bonus to any saves against teleportation or planar travel.

I think this would make a good Skorne. oh, and swap "goblin" for "skorne" in languages known.

[JNAProductions]

Great googily moogily, that's a lot of units. Zenbear, mind narrowing down to a few you want for start?

[ZenBear]

Great googily moogily, that's a lot of units. Zenbear, mind narrowing down to a few you want for start?

If anything in particular captures your imagination, do as you please! As for me, priority would fall thus:

1. Agonizer. These sad little buggers really highlight the practical depravity of the Skorne, and would lead to interesting combat scenarios with some emotional punch.
https://warmachineuniversity.com/mw/index.php/Agonizer

2. Titan Gladiator. I expect the other variations of Titan (Sentry, Canoneer, Bronzeback) will be simple enough to tweak from this baseline beastie.
https://warmachineuniversity.com/mw/index.php/Titan_Gladiator

3. Paingiver Beast Handlers. As mentioned previously, I intend to replace the Skorne race with Tieflings, so if possible work with that base race in mind.
https://warmachineuniversity.com/mw/index.php/Paingiver_Beast_Handlers

Thanks! I will try my hand at this myself once I’m done with work tonight, but I really do love your work so I look forward to seeing your ideas!

[ZenBear]

Finally coming back to Skorne! Sorry for the wait, hope this doesn't count as necromancy.

Agonizer
AC: 13
HP: 54 (12d8)
Speed: 30 ft.
STR 12 (+1) DEX 10 (0) CON 10 (0)
INT 3 (-4) WIS 8 (-1) CHA 14 (+2)
Agonies: Whenever the Agonizer feels threatened or suffers damage, it can use an action to exude an aura around itself. The aura lasts until the Agonizer chooses to end it as a bonus action or falls unconscious. Only one aura can be active at a time.

Gnawing Pain: Enemy creatures within 30 ft. must pass a DC 12 Wisdom saving throw or become Weakened for the round.
Maddening: Enemy creatures within 30 ft. must pass a DC 12 Wisdom saving throw or suffer 3(1d6) Stress.
Spiritual Affliction: Enemy creatures within 30 ft. that attempt to cast a spell or cantrip must pass a DC 12 Wisdom saving throw or the magic fails.

Repulsion: As an action, the Agonizer can blast nearby foes with a wave of force. Enemies within 10 ft. of the Agonizer must pass a DC 12 Strength saving throw or be knocked back 10 ft. Recharge 5-6.
Claw: +3, 3(1d4+1) slashing damage.
CR: ?

An infant Titan, discarded as warbeast material by the beast handlers. Instead, they torture the poor thing into a wailing and sorry creature, whose mere presence is disturbing and unnerving for even the most fearless of creatures. I have no idea what CR to make them based on their auras, but by their stats they are Offensive CR 1/8 and Defensive CR 1/2, making them effective CR 1/4. They are supposed to be a lesser warbeast support unit that debuffs enemies to make combat easier for their masters. I'm still uncertain about Gnawing Pain imposing the Weakened condition since that only affects STR characters. In Warmachine/Hordes all units' melee damage is based on STR. Perhaps instead it imposes Disadvantage on attack rolls? Also, Maddening is designed with the expectation that the homebrew Darkest Dungeon Stress rules (https://kor-artificer.tumblr.com/post/168120537089/darkest-dungeon-stress-system-in-dd-download) are in effect. If not, I have no idea what other effect it ought to have. In Hordes, adding fury to a warbeast makes it more likely to Frenzy on its next turn, which makes it spend its turn to attack the nearest model. Perhaps it could apply a similar effect and make enemies attack the nearest creature?

Paingiver Beast Handler
AC: 14 (leather armor)
HP: (d8)
Speed: 30 ft.
STR 10 DEX 16 CON
INT 11 WIS 10 CHA 12
Anatomical Precision: When a Paingiver misses with an attack, it still deals half (or only 1?) damage to its target.
Condition: As an action, target friendly Skorne warbeast within 10 ft. gains or loses 1 Fury (Inspiration).
Enrage: As an action, target friendly Skorne warbeast within 10 ft. adds 2(1d4) damage to its damage rolls for the next round.
Medicate: Paingiver Beast Handlers have the Healer feat.
Prodding: Friendly Skorne warbeasts gain Aggressive (https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Monsters:Orc/#h-Orc) when they begin their turn adjacent to a Beast Handler.
Bladed Whip: +5, 6(1d6+3) slashing damage, reach.
CR: ?

Anatomical Precision is really hard to convert to a system without a universal Armor/DR system, which is why it took me so long to come back to this thread. Perhaps instead of guaranteeing damage it ignores armor and shield bonuses to AC? Once again this punishes STR builds more than DEX, which I would prefer to avoid.