Dr. Frankenstein's Monster
Dr. Frankenstein's Monster — The Encounter
The Wretch of the Wandering Spark, stitched from grave-cold flesh · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Dr. Frankenstein's Monster
They call it the Wretch, though it was never given a name by the philosopher who quickened it. Assembled in secret from the harvest of charnel houses and gibbets, it was woken by a stolen bolt of lightning and abandoned in the same hour. What its maker intended as a triumph of natural science became a creature of grief: it remembers being unloved, and the memory is a wound that festers into violence. It speaks haltingly, when it speaks at all, of cold and of fire and of the one who turned away. The harpoon it carries was scavenged from a whaling town it passed through by night. Folk who corner it learn too late that its sutured frame shrugs off blade and bludgeon alike, and that the very lightning meant to destroy it only feeds the spark within. It does not hunt for sport. It hunts because the world will not let it rest.
Run Dr. Frankenstein's Monster in Sixty Seconds
- Never zap it. Lightning HEALS the Wretch (Galvanic Vitality). Tell the lightning-sorcerer up front, then watch them learn the hard way if they don't listen.
- Open with the harpoon. Reach 10 ft. plus Wrenching Haul lets you yank the enemy's caster or healer out of formation and pin them next to the brute.
- Kill-priority: backline. It ignores the tank and lumbers for whoever looks softest; protect your squishies or it drags them off and Slams them prone.
- When bloodied, it snaps. At half HP it goes berserk and hits the NEAREST creature — position an expendable ally or a wall between it and your party to misdirect the rage.
- Three ways to run it: tragic (it pauses, almost speaks, then strikes), relentless (silent, never stops advancing), or weaponized (a handler goads it like a beast on a chain).
Dr. Frankenstein's Monster
Medium construct, neutral
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINEGalvanic Vitality. When the wretch takes lightning damage, it takes no damage and instead regains hit points equal to the lightning damage dealt. Its body crackles with the borrowed spark that first stirred it to life.
Berserk When Bloodied. While the wretch has half its hit points or fewer, it attacks the nearest creature it can see on each of its turns. If no creature is near enough to move to and attack, it attacks an object, preferring one smaller than itself.
Actions
Multiattack. The wretch makes two attacks with its iron harpoon, or one harpoon attack and one Slam.
Iron Harpoon. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 17 (3d8 + 4) piercing damage. On a critical hit, the target is grappled (escape DC 14) as the barbed head lodges in flesh.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 14 (2d8 + 5) bludgeoning damage, and if the target is Large or smaller it must succeed on a DC 15 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Wrenching Haul. Reaction When a creature the wretch has grappled with its harpoon tries to move away, the wretch can drag it up to 10 feet back toward itself and the creature's movement ends.
A towering patchwork man in a rotted greatcoat, neck girded with iron bolts, hauls a double-headed harpoon across stooped shoulders. Its mismatched eyes hold a sorrow that curdles, without warning, into ruinous rage.
Dr. Frankenstein's Monster, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINESorrowful Resolve (signature). Once per short rest, when an ally the Wretch can see is reduced to 0 hit points, the Wretch can move up to its speed toward that ally and make one Slam attack against the nearest enemy, born of a grief it cannot voice.
Actions
Iron Harpoon. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 14 (3d6 + 4) piercing damage.
Reactions
Interpose. Reaction When an adjacent ally is hit by an attack, the Wretch can move into the blow, becoming the target instead and taking the damage in their place.
Won over by the only person who ever showed it kindness, the Wretch shields its companion with a tenderness as fierce as its rage. It will not be commanded, only trusted.
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.
Open by wading into the densest knot of PCs and harpooning the squishiest caster, dragging them out of the line with Wrenching Haul. Do NOT throw lightning at it — that heals it; kill it with fire, acid, or magic weapons. A brute add-on at this tier: pair it with a mad-scientist handler or a pack of lesser constructs.
Open against a clustered front line: harpoon the priest or wizard, drag them adjacent, then Slam to knock prone and lock them down. Once bloodied it goes berserk and swings at whoever is nearest — bait that toward its own allies if you can. Resists nonmagical weapons and feeds on lightning, so reward parties that switch to fire/magic. Frame it as the muscle beside a controlling spellcaster, not a lone boss.
Use it as the unkillable anvil of a larger encounter — its damage resistances and lightning healing make it a grind, so it shines beside a glass-cannon caster or a swarm of minions that the PCs must split fire to handle. Open by hauling the most mobile PC into the press, then knock the rest prone with Slam. Pair it with a bigger threat; alone, a high-tier party simply out-acts it.
Put Dr. Frankenstein's Monster 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 Dr. Frankenstein's Monster?
Its home stat block is CR 6 (2,300 XP), a Tier 2 brute built for parties of levels 5-10. Scaled blocks for Tier 1 (CR ~2) and Tier 3 (CR ~11) are provided so you can drop it into any campaign without rebuilding it.
Can Dr. Frankenstein's Monster be a companion or ally?
Yes. The companion block, 'The Wretch, Bound,' models the creature won over by a single act of kindness — it shields its companion with Interpose, charges to a fallen ally with Sorrowful Resolve, and fights at roughly 60% of the adversary's durability. It cannot be commanded, only trusted.
Why does it heal from lightning instead of taking damage?
The Wretch was animated by a captured bolt of lightning, and its galvanized frame drinks in any electrical charge. Treat lightning attacks against it as healing equal to the damage rolled — it is one of the encounter's signature 'gotcha' moments, so make sure your players feel the consequence.
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.
Technical Specifications
32mm, 75mm
STL, Pre-supported STL
Standard or ABS-like resin, 0.05mm layer height
Yes — ready to print, optimized supports included
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