Frostbound Fiends

[JNAProductions]

Frostbound Foot Soldier
Medium Elemental, Neutral Evil
Armor Class 18 (Icy Plate)
Hit Points 43 (5d8+20)
Speed 25'


Strength
Dexterity
Constitution
Intelligence
Wisdom
Charisma


18 (+4)
10 (0)
18 (+4)
10 (0)
10 (0)
10 (0)


Skills Perception +2
Damage Resistances Psychic, Poison
Damage Immunities Cold
Damage Vulnerabilities Fire
Senses Darkvision 60', Passive Perception 12
Languages Primordial, Infernal
Challenge 2
Icy Ablation
Whenever the Frostbound Foot Soldier is struck by a melee attack, they may retaliate with a burst of icy shards. This deals 1d6 cold damage to the attacker, unless they use their reaction to negate the damage.

Actions
Frost-Wreathed Great Weapon Melee Weapon Attack:
+6 to-hit, reach 5', one target. Hit: 2d6+4 slashing, piercing, or bludgeoning damage (chosen once and immutable after that) plus 1d6 cold damage.

Icy Burst Once Per Short Rest
The Frostbound Foot Soldier lets out a burst of ice. All creatures within 10' of the Frostbound Foot Soldier must make a DC 14 Constitution save, taking 2d10 cold damage and becoming grappled until the end of their next turn on a failed save, with half damage and no grappling on a success. Creatures immune to cold are also immune to the grapple effect.

Reactions
Protect
When an ally is targeted for an attack while within 5' of the Frostbound Foot Soldier, they may use their reaction to add +2 to the ally's AC or Dexterity save against the attack.

Frostbound Berserker
Medium Elemental, Neutral Evil
Armor Class 16 (Icy Scale)
Hit Points 77 (9d8+36)
Speed 35'


Strength
Dexterity
Constitution
Intelligence
Wisdom
Charisma


18 (+4)
12 (+1)
18 (+4)
8 (-1)
10 (0)
12 (+1)


Skills Athletics +6
Damage Resistances Poison, Psychic
Damage Immunities Cold
Damage Vulnerabilities Fire
Senses Darkvision 60', Passive Perception 10
Languages Primordial, Infernal
Challenge 3
Reckless Attacks
The Frostbound Berserker may choose to gain advantage on all melee attacks made until the start of their next turn, at the cost of granting advantage on all attacks made against them.

Actions
Frost-Wreathed Great Weapon Melee Weapon Attack:
+6 to-hit, reach 5', one target. Hit: 2d6+4 bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (chosen once) plus 1d6 cold damage.

Extra Attack
The Frostbound Berserker makes two attacks or other attack actions.

Bonus Actions
Frothing Frosty Resilience
The Frostbound Berserker spends a hit die, regaining the number rolled plus its Constitution modifier in HP.

Reactions
Retaliate
When struck by a target within 5', a Frostbound Berserker may use its reaction to immediately make a Frost-Wreathed Great Weapon attack against the attacker.

Frostbound Leader
Medium Elemental, Neutral Evil
Armor Class 20 (Icy Plate, Shield)
Hit Points 60 (7d8+28)
Speed 25'


Strength
Dexterity
Constitution
Intelligence
Wisdom
Charisma


16 (+3)
14 (+2)
18 (+4)
14 (+2)
16 (+3)
16 (+3)


Skills Athletics +5, Perception +5
Damage Resistances Psychic, Poison
Damage Immunities Cold
Damage Vulnerabilities Fire
Senses Darkvision 60', Passive Perception 15
Languages Primordial, Infernal, Common
Challenge 4
Inspiring Presence
The Frostbound Leader's presence is enough to inspire their minions to greater deeds. Whenever a Frostbound creature (other than a Frostbound Leader) is dropped to 0 HP or killed outright while within 60' and line of sight of the Leader, they may take a single action before they die.

Actions
Frost-Wreathed Weapon Melee Weapon Attack:
+5 to-hit, reach 5', one target. Hit: 1d6+3 bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (chosen once), and 1d6 cold damage.

Extra Attack
The Frostbound Leader makes two Frost-Wreathed Weapon attacks or other attack actions.

On My Target
The Frostbound Leader designates a single target within 60' and visible to itself. All Frostbound creatures gain +1d4 to any attack rolls made against the creature until the start of the Frostbound Leader's next turn.

Sound The Retreat!
The Frostbound Leader uses the Dash and Disengage actions. All Frostbound creatures within 30', other than itself, may use their reaction to move up to their speed without provoking Attacks of Opportunity.

Defensive Formation
The Frostbound Leader and all Frostbound Creatures within 30' gain +2 to AC until the start of their next turns.

Bonus Actions
Strike
The Frostbound Leader selects a single Frostbound creature within 60' and visible to itself. That creature may make a single attack as a reaction.

Reactions
Bait And Switch
When targeted for an attack, the Frostbound Leader may switch places with an adjacent Frostbound creature, other than another Frostbound Leader.

[sandmote]

Is there any fluff for these? I feel like with demons being resistant and devils being immune, fiends vulnerable to fire would have been wiped out long ago. I'm guessing they are on Agathys in Carcaeri, using their cohesion in battle to survive, but don't think I can extrapolate much more than that from the mechanics.

Mechanically, I haven't checked the CRs, but I really like the utility benefits. They're not just bag of hit points! Inspiring Presence should have a listed range though.

[JNAProductions]

Is there any fluff for these? I feel like with demons being resistant and devils being immune, fiends vulnerable to fire would have been wiped out long ago. I'm guessing they are on Agathys in Carcaeri, using their cohesion in battle to survive, but don't think I can extrapolate much more than that from the mechanics.

Mechanically, I haven't checked the CRs, but I really like the utility benefits. They're not just bag of hit points! Inspiring Presence should have a listed range though.

Added a 60' and LoS limitation on Inspiring Presence.

And these aren't necessarily demons or devils. They're malicious elemental spirits, possibly corrupted ones.

[sandmote]

And these aren't necessarily demons or devils. They're malicious elemental spirits, possibly corrupted ones. Okay, trying this again:


Demons are resistant to fire
Devils are immune to fire
Frostbound fiends (which I take to be neither of the above) are vulnerable to fire


As such, I expect the Frostbound fiends to have been nearly wiped out in the blood war; both main forces can deal massive AoE on Frostbound troops at minimal risk to their allies. So do you have a 'canonical' location where this race has in fact managed to survive? They're listed as neutral evil fiends, so I guessed Agathys. Does your labeling them elementals mean they're on the Plane of Ice instead?

[Twelvetrees]

For the sake of more context, I'm assuming these are related to this thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?558845-Argos-The-Eternal-Frost-Two-Stage-Boss).

I've also got to admit to some confusion on why these are fiends as opposed to elementals. There's certainly precedence for evil elemental creatures with things like Efreeti.


Monster Design
With the Foot Soldier, Icy Ablation needing a Dex save for every single melee attack feels like something that could bog down the game a bit. Retaliatory damage usually slows things down a bit, but needing a save every time to determine if it actually happens seems needlessly complicated. I think it might be more straightforward to just have it deal 1d6 cold damage with no save.

Icy Burst would likely be better off causing creatures speed to be reduced to 0 instead of imposing the grappled condition. Being grappled causes some needless confusion around how the grapple is being maintained.


For the Berserker, can you explain why you went with Frothing Frosty Resilience instead of just giving them regeneration?


And in regards to the Leader, how long does On My Target last? Bait and Switch could probably use the exact same wording as a Goblin Boss's Redirect Attack to be more clear.


A few notes on the Challenges.
When running them through the DMG guidelines, I’m pegging the Foot Soldier at a Challenge 3. Defensively, it’s Challenge 2 if we consider Protect to be about equivalent to Parry. Offensively, I think it’s Challenge 4, especially if Icy Ablation triggers a couple of times.

The Berserker comes out at Challenge 6, as far as I can tell. Challenge 4 Defensively, when the extra hit points it gains from Frothing Frosty Reslience are accounted for and Challenge 8 Offiensively, based off the three attacks it likely gets each turn.

The Leader is Challenge 4 for Defense and Offense, but I suspect that Inspiring Presence is probably worth bumping its Challenge by 1, putting it at 5.

[JNAProductions]

For the sake of more context, I'm assuming these are related to this thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?558845-Argos-The-Eternal-Frost-Two-Stage-Boss).

I've also got to admit to some confusion on why these are fiends as opposed to elementals. There's certainly precedence for evil elemental creatures with things like Efreeti.


Monster Design
With the Foot Soldier, Icy Ablation needing a Dex save for every single melee attack feels like something that could bog down the game a bit. Retaliatory damage usually slows things down a bit, but needing a save every time to determine if it actually happens seems needlessly complicated. I think it might be more straightforward to just have it deal 1d6 cold damage with no save.

Icy Burst would likely be better off causing creatures speed to be reduced to 0 instead of imposing the grappled condition. Being grappled causes some needless confusion around how the grapple is being maintained.


For the Berserker, can you explain why you went with Frothing Frosty Resilience instead of just giving them regeneration?


And in regards to the Leader, how long does On My Target last? Bait and Switch could probably use the exact same wording as a Goblin Boss's Redirect Attack to be more clear.


A few notes on the Challenges.
When running them through the DMG guidelines, I’m pegging the Foot Soldier at a Challenge 3. Defensively, it’s Challenge 2 if we consider Protect to be about equivalent to Parry. Offensively, I think it’s Challenge 4, especially if Icy Ablation triggers a couple of times.

The Berserker comes out at Challenge 6, as far as I can tell. Challenge 4 Defensively, when the extra hit points it gains from Frothing Frosty Reslience are accounted for and Challenge 8 Offiensively, based off the three attacks it likely gets each turn.

The Leader is Challenge 4 for Defense and Offense, but I suspect that Inspiring Presence is probably worth bumping its Challenge by 1, putting it at 5.

Changed to Elementals.

Changed Ablation to allow a Reaction to negate the damage, making it a player choice.

Grappled was chosen so they could not benefit from speed boosts.

Action negation would not remove regeneration, but it does remove their ability to self-heal.

Added a duration to On My Target.

I used this site (https://5e.tools/crcalculator.html#0,13,1,3,false,Medium,1,10,false ,0,false,0,) to determine their CR. I could re-run the numbers using my DMG, but I'm a lazy person. :P

Also, this actually has nothing to do with Argos. It's for a forum game, unrelated to that boss.

[sandmote]

Changed to Elementals. Yeah, okay, makes a but more sense to be honest.

[Twelvetrees]

Changed to Elementals.

Cool. I can certainly imagine these as part of an elemental army of some sort.



Changed Ablation to allow a Reaction to negate the damage, making it a player choice.

This feels odd to me, primarily because I see the player choice having already occurred when they decided to make a melee attack against a monster that appears to be a barely-contained icy explosion. Can you explain what you're trying to accomplish with this? I don't know that I fully understand your intention.



Grappled was chosen so they could not benefit from speed boosts.

I see - and it appears I hadn't read the rules of how the grapple condition works nearly as closely as I could have. Thanks for this, I learned something new!



Action negation would not remove regeneration, but it does remove their ability to self-heal.

I suspected it was something like that, so it's good to have confirmation that was what you were going for.



I used this site (https://5e.tools/crcalculator.html#0,13,1,3,false,Medium,1,10,false ,0,false,0,) to determine their CR. I could re-run the numbers using my DMG, but I'm a lazy person. :P

Ooh, thanks for the link. That's quite handy.


Also, this actually has nothing to do with Argos. It's for a forum game, unrelated to that boss.

Interesting. The theming was similar and the fire vulnerability was present in both, so I figured there was a chance they were related. Sounds like I was off.

[JNAProductions]

Cool. I can certainly imagine these as part of an elemental army of some sort.

This feels odd to me, primarily because I see the player choice having already occurred when they decided to make a melee attack against a monster that appears to be a barely-contained icy explosion. Can you explain what you're trying to accomplish with this? I don't know that I fully understand your intention.

I see - and it appears I hadn't read the rules of how the grapple condition works nearly as closely as I could have. Thanks for this, I learned something new!

I suspected it was something like that, so it's good to have confirmation that was what you were going for.

Ooh, thanks for the link. That's quite handy.

Interesting. The theming was similar and the fire vulnerability was present in both, so I figured there was a chance they were related. Sounds like I was off.

Yeah, I can see why you'd think they were related. They easily could be too, but Argos didn't even enter my mind when I made these guys.

And I wanted a way to avoid the Ablation effect, but I do agree a save on every single melee attack is excessive.