Gigglesnare
Gigglesnare — The Encounter
The Grinning Pox, brewer of laughing rot · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Gigglesnare
Where the swamp-fever takes a body and does not kill it, sometimes it makes a Gigglesnare. So the marsh-witches teach: a glutton or a plague-bearer swells and swells until the rot becomes a kind of joy, and the thing that crawls back out of the mire is forever laughing. It cannot stop. The grin is fixed, the lungs wheeze a wet chuckle even in sleep. Gigglesnare learned to bottle its own sickness, lashing a copper still to its spine and a dispensing maul to its fist, so that every blow spits a fresh dose of the laughing pox. Villages it has passed through are known by their silence and their grins, every corpse left smiling. Hunters say you smell it long before you hear it, and hear it long before you see it. They say, too, that fire is the only mercy, though the tank tends to answer fire with a final, spreading gift of its own.
Run Gigglesnare in Sixty Seconds
- Smell first. Reeking Aura poisons anyone who starts their turn within 5 feet (DC by tier) — melee PCs eat disadvantage just for standing next to it.
- Open with Bile Spray. Hit the back-line caster from 20 feet, then wade into the cluster so the aura and Multiattack land on the most bodies.
- Kill-priority: nobody, but fire is the trap. Fire damage ruptures the back-tank (Contagious Mirth) for a 15-foot poison burst — warn melee allies before they torch it next to themselves.
- When bloodied, it cackles and presses in to maximize aura and poisoned saves; remember Wheezing Cackle hands it 10 temp HP every time a creature drops near it.
- Three ways to run it: a lone brute that the party must out-position; a fog-lair plague-spreader paired with a caster boss; or a wandering horror whose grinning, smiling corpse-trail is the adventure hook.
Gigglesnare
Large aberration, chaotic evil
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINEContagious Mirth. Signature. When Gigglesnare is reduced to 0 hit points, or whenever it takes fire damage, the alchemical tank on its back ruptures. Each creature within 15 feet must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or take 18 (4d8) poison damage and be poisoned until the end of its next turn; on a success it takes half damage and is not poisoned.
Reeking Aura. A creature that starts its turn within 5 feet of Gigglesnare must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or be poisoned until the start of its next turn. On a successful save, the creature is immune to this aura for 24 hours.
Actions
Multiattack. Gigglesnare makes two attacks: one with its Pox Mace and one with its Bile Spray, or two with its Pox Mace.
Pox Mace. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8+4) bludgeoning damage plus 9 (2d8) poison damage.
Bile Spray. Ranged Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, range 20/40 ft., one target. Hit: 14 (4d6) poison damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or be poisoned until the end of its next turn.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Wheezing Cackle. Reaction: When a creature Gigglesnare can see within 30 feet drops to 0 hit points, Gigglesnare lets out a wet, delighted cackle and gains 10 temporary hit points.
A bloated, toxin-green brute with a permanent fanged grin, Gigglesnare drags an alchemical bile-tank strapped to its back that feeds a sputtering, spike-headed dispenser-mace. It wades through battle giggling, leaving a fog of laughing rot and a trail of skulls in its wake.
Gigglesnare, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINESpore Burst (signature). When Gigglesnare is hit by a melee attack, the attacker must succeed on a DC 13 Constitution saving throw or take 5 (2d4) poison damage.
Actions
Festering Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 9 (2d6+2) piercing damage plus 4 (1d8) poison damage.
Reactions
Giddy Lurch. When an ally within 5 feet is hit by an attack, Gigglesnare shoves between them and itself becomes the target; it takes the damage instead.
A waddling, grinning lesser pox-thing that trails its bigger kin like a devoted, drooling pup, eager to share the sickness.
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 with Bile Spray from range to soften the front-liner, then wade in and swing the Pox Mace. Keep it adjacent to as many PCs as possible so Reeking Aura forces saves every round. Pair it with a stronger swamp boss — it is a damage-dealing add-on, not the main threat.
Open by charging into the cluster so Reeking Aura and Bile Spray hit several PCs at once. Kill-priority is whoever carries fire — fire ruptures the tank early and wastes Contagious Mirth on no one. When bloodied it grins wider and presses in to spread the poisoned condition. Best fielded beside a controller or caster.
Run it with a pack of lesser pox-things or in a fog-choked lair where the Reeking Aura stacks with difficult, poisonous terrain. Open with Bile Spray on the squishiest target, then Multiattack the front-liner. Pair it with a bigger threat — at this tier Gigglesnare is the muscle and the plague-spreader, not the centerpiece.
Put Gigglesnare 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 Gigglesnare?
Its home build is CR 6 (2,300 XP) for a 5th–10th-level party. Stat blocks for Tier 1 (~CR 2) and Tier 3 (~CR 11) are included; traits and actions stay identical, only the numbers shift.
Can Gigglesnare be a companion or ally?
Gigglesnare itself is an adversary, not a player ally. For a bound creature use Snickerspore, the lesser pox-thing companion provided — a 38-HP poison guardian that bursts spores when struck and lurches in front of allies to take a hit.
Is Gigglesnare a solo boss?
No. It has no legendary actions and a single reaction, so a four-PC party will out-act it. Field it as a damage-and-disease add-on beside a true boss, or salt a fight with several alongside a controller in a fog-choked lair.
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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