The barbarian froze at the sound of a distant scream before the ranger called his attention back to the task at hand. He grumbled and hefted the pick overhead before bringing it down upon the cluster of crystals. Gathering the shards, he dumped them into the basket that he and the rest of his party conducted themselves around, stuck with busywork instead of real adventures. His companions didn’t echo his statements aloud but their set lips and hard eyes suggested at similar sentiments. Their pity party was disrupted as the barbarian drove his pick into the earth once more, cracking rock and stone to reveal a fanged maw. A roar erupted from the mouth that caused the barbarian to stumble back, knocking over their gathered crystals. As the screech filled the cavern, more bug-like creatures erupted from the earth, raising in a cacophonic chorus. Despite the beasts bursting from beneath, a wild grin erupted across the barbarian’s face and he hefted the pick overhead once more as he scrambled to his feet.
This week, I’m taking a crack at two new things – a monster from Deep Rock Galactic and a troop! I’ve never even run a troop before and was interested in testing it out with the glyphid grunts as they are a bit too big to be in a swarm. This meant they had a few abilities integral to their design – Troop Defenses, Troop Movement, and Form Up. As a troop’s health needs to be divisible by 3, I used a high Hit Point value while settling on a moderate AC to compensate for that. Its saves are also on the lower end and it has the usual weaknesses to area and splash damage of a troop. However, they also have an immunity to visual effects since they lack eyes and instead rely on a suite of other senses, including Echolocation and Scent. Rather than having Strikes that they utilize, glyphid grunts have an area attack like most troops that requires a Reflex save at a moderate DC. It uses this DC given the range of the area effect, ease of use, and based off of other similar saves seen on other troops. The damage dealt by this Jaws and Claws starts at below low, because of its area, than deals low damage on a two-action use, and then amps up to high damage if the glyphid grunts do nothing but spend all three actions on Jaws and Claws.
Since glyphid grunts seem to be encountered in environments of rock and stone, I included Rock Tunneler so they could move through such environments. Even after all that, the glyphid grunt troop felt a little lacking, especially in regards to unique features that distinguish them from other creatures. To help make them feel more distinct, I added the From Beneath ability to their kit. Like metamagic/spellshape type effects, this modifies following actions, as long as those actions are for Jaws and Claws. This limits the glyphid to a two-action use of its attack at most, but then traps foes in the mass of gnashing teeth and slashing limbs. This forces the enemies to reposition to avoid some meager damage at a high DC at the end of their turn. Looking back on it, I think the damage could be increased given the ease of escaping it, but I honestly think one of the biggest benefits of this ability is that it encourages atypical tactics from the glyphid grunts rather than just having them swing out every round.
I want to mention before moving on that one of the reasons that I didn’t build a singular glyphid grunt is because I think it’s fairly easy to adapt them from another creature. Not that I don’t think it would require some heavy modification, but using the base stat blocks of the giant fly or hunting spider and then socketing in some more glyphid abilities covers a lot of it.
Pathfinder 2e:
I was surprised to discover that troops in 1e don’t require a save or a roll or anything like that, but I suppose that is how swarms work as well – I just haven’t played in a while. I adapted from below somewhat for the 1e version of the troop and then created an additional ability to help them capitalize on this change in the form of devour. Beyond that, they’re pretty basic and a fairly straight translation of the 2e version. Another addition that stands out for this edition of the creature is Combat Reflexes, which can get very punishing when combined with its from below ability.
Pathfinder 1e:
Blue's D&D 5e:
ENCOUNTER HOOKS
Deep and Dark: The heroes are aspiring adventurers who have been tasked with retrieving tools or remaining ore from an abandoned mine. This simple task starts to become a challenge when they find themselves beset by a glyphid grunt swarm that bursts from beneath them. This attack may lead into a destabilization of the ground they are standing upon, leading to them to fall deeper yet and leading into a whole adventure within the underdark.
If you're interested in joining the discussion on what creatures I'm working on or just discussing your own homebrew works, check out our Discord! If you want to get some teasers or help us get to our yet unlisted milestones for extra content, check out the Twitter.
If you have the time, please check out the Monster Monday video on the glyphid grunt troop over on the Ready to Die channel. We just reached 100 subscribers - which isn't much in the great scheme of things but is a nice milestone.
Have a monstrous Monday!
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