Newton
gold-blade twin-scimitar reaver of the Grim Flock
Newton — The Encounter
gold-blade twin-scimitar reaver of the Grim Flock · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Newton
Among the Grim Flock - that ragged warband of armored corvids who pick over the battlefields of fallen kingdoms - Newton is counted a blademaster, though his brothers name him for the patience of a thing that waits beneath a gallows. He bargained for the twin gold-edged falchions in some lightless rookery, and now he opens fights by crippling the strongest foe so the lesser crows may swarm what he leaves bleeding. He does not crave glory; he craves the meal after. When his warning croak rings out, the Flock knows the field has turned, and they wheel to either reinforce or scatter on his judgement alone. Killers say his red eyes track you long before his blades do.
Run Newton in Sixty Seconds
- Kill priority: drop Newton mid-fight - his warning croak rallies the rest of the Grim Flock, so silencing him early breaks their nerve.
- Open with: a Falchion on the party's heaviest hitter, forgoing extra damage to slash their speed by 10 ft. and strand them from their allies.
- Each round: two Falchion swings, hold the Sidestep reaction for the biggest incoming hit to turn a crit or solid blow into a miss.
- When bloodied: he croaks the warning cry (120 ft.) - decide right then whether the Flock reinforces or scatters.
- Run it three ways: lone slowing-bruiser (T1), frontline elite among crows (T2), or blade-captain peeling a backliner for the pack (T3).
Newton
Medium humanoid (corvid), neutral evil
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINETwin Falchions. Newton fights with a curved blade in each clawed hand. Once on each of his turns, when he hits a creature with one falchion attack, he can choose to forgo the extra damage and instead reduce the target's speed by 10 feet until the start of his next turn as he hooks and drags the foe off balance.
Carrion Wariness. Newton has advantage on Perception checks that rely on sight and cannot be surprised while he can see. The first time he is reduced to half his hit points or fewer in a fight, he croaks a warning cry that the rest of the Grim Flock can hear out to 120 feet.
Actions
Multiattack. Newton makes two Falchion attacks.
Falchion. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 14 (2d8+3) slashing damage.
Beak Snap. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 8 (2d4+3) piercing damage.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Sidestep (Reaction). When a creature Newton can see hits him with an attack, he can add 2 to his AC against that attack, potentially causing it to miss, twisting his cloaked frame aside on his taloned feet.
A hunched crow-headed reaver in gilded black plate, a curved falchion gleaming in each taloned hand. He hooks his prey, drags it off its feet, and lets the rest of the Flock descend.
Guideline numbers — formula-tuned and read from the miniature's design, not yet table-proven. Tell us how it ran in the comments.
How It Fights — by Tier
Same creature, scaled threat. The traits never change; only the numbers move.
Run him as a lone bruiser the party can actually drop, but never alone - pair him with a knot of weaker Grim Flock crows. He opens on the toughest melee fighter, hooks their speed down, and lets the lesser birds gang the dazed target.
Newton's home tier: a frontline elite of the warband, not a solo. He marks the highest-damage PC, slows them with Twin Falchions, and uses Sidestep to weather the reprisal. When he hits half HP, his warning cry tells the rest of the Flock to commit or flee.
Field him as a blade-captain inside a full Grim Flock pack, never a boss. He fights as part of the flight - hooking and dragging priority targets into the swarm's reach. Concentrate his attacks to peel a healer or controller, and let the warband finish what he opens.
Put Newton on the table
Download the presupported STL and run the fight tonight — the model, and the encounter that comes with it.
Get the STL on MyMiniFactory →Clay Cyanide Companion Rules v1
How a bound creature acts
- A companion acts on its owner's initiative, immediately after the owner.
- It uses the Companion block above — roughly ×0.6 HP and damage, no recharge abilities, and at most one reaction trait.
- It moves freely; it takes its Action only while its owner is conscious.
- At 0 HP a companion is broken, not dead — restored on a long rest unless your table rules otherwise.
Original Clay Cyanide material © Clay Cyanide LLC — explicitly not the non-SRD official sidekick rules.
Questions, Asked at the Table
What CR is Newton?
Newton is built at CR 6 (2,300 XP) in his native Tier 2 form - an elite skirmisher, not a boss. Scale him down to roughly CR 2 for Tier 1 parties or up to roughly CR 11 for Tier 3 using the alternate stat lines; the traits stay identical and only the numbers move.
How does Newton fight alongside the rest of the Grim Flock?
He is the warband's blademaster, not a lone champion. Newton opens by hooking and slowing the party's strongest fighter so the lesser crows can swarm the crippled target, and his warning croak at half HP tells the whole Flock to either pile in or wheel away. Always run him with supporting Grim Flock models.
Is Newton solo-capable?
No. He has no legendary actions and only a single defensive reaction, so a lone Newton will be overwhelmed by a balanced party. He shines as one threat among a coordinated Grim Flock warband, where his speed-slow and battlefield control let the rest of the pack do the killing.
Tell Us How It Ran
This work includes material taken from the System Reference Document 5.1 ("SRD 5.1") by Wizards of the Coast LLC and available at dnd.wizards.com/resources/systems-reference-document. The SRD 5.1 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License available at creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode.
Clay Cyanide Miniatures is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC. This content is compatible with the fifth edition of the world's most popular fantasy roleplaying game. Companion rules, lore, names, and original mechanics © Clay Cyanide LLC.
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