Lochness Monster
Lochness Monster — The Encounter
The long-necked terror of the drowned highland loch · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Lochness Monster
Fishermen of the cold northern lochs speak of a beast older than any boundary stone: a serpent that was in the water before the first coracle was launched and will be there when the last village drowns. It does not roar or boast. It waits in the black trench at the heart of the loch, surfacing only at dusk and in the white mist of dawn, when a long neck and a single watching eye break the glass of the water and are gone before a witness can be sure. Those who follow the wakes it leaves never return; their boats are found capsized, hulls scored by enormous teeth. The old grimoires counsel against hunting it at all, for the serpent fights on its own terms, seizing prey in its jaws and carrying it down into the lightless cold where no spell of fire will follow. It is no demon and no devil, only a hunger that the deep has kept for a very long time.
Run Lochness Monster in Sixty Seconds
- Hold the deep water. The serpent wants every fight at the water's edge. Keep it within reach of deep or open water so it can submerge and Drag Under; on dry land it is slow (20 ft.) and far easier to surround.
- Open from below. Round one, hit a creature that has not acted yet for advantage, Bite to grapple, then Tail-sweep the cluster to knock them prone and break their formation.
- Kill-priority: the grappled victim's rescuers. Once it has someone in its jaws it will Drag Under toward deep water every round — anyone trying to free or follow the captive is the next bite.
- When bloodied, it stops trading blows and dives: it drags its current grapple under and retreats into the depths to surface again next round, so don't expect a clean stand-up fight.
- Three ways to run it: lone ambusher at a remote loch (Tier 1); brutal add-on beside a flagship boss or with Loch-Whelps (Tier 2); lair monster of a drowned hall that isolates one PC at a time (Tier 3).
Lochness Monster
Huge monstrosity, unaligned
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINEHold Breath. The serpent can hold its breath for 1 hour and is equally at home in the black depths and the surface mist.
Surge from the Deep. Signature. On the first round of combat, the serpent has advantage on attack rolls against any creature that has not yet acted. A target it hits with a bite while submerged or in mist is also grappled (escape DC 15).
Actions
Multiattack. The serpent makes one Bite attack and one Tail attack. If both hit the same target, the target must succeed on a DC 15 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 18 (3d8+5) piercing damage, and a creature of size Large or smaller is grappled (escape DC 15).
Tail. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 15 ft., one target. Hit: 14 (2d8+5) bludgeoning damage, and the target is pushed up to 10 feet away.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Drag Under. Reaction, when the serpent hits a grappled creature with a Bite: it can move up to half its swim speed without provoking opportunity attacks, dragging the grappled creature with it toward deep water.
A vast emerald coil heaves out of glacial water, its long neck arcing above a frilled, fanged head while the pale ridged belly catches the light. The beast is built to vanish back beneath the surface the instant a hunter draws breath.
Lochness Monster, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINESlick Hide (signature). The whelp has advantage on checks and saving throws made to escape a grapple or restraint, and ignores difficult terrain made of water, mud, or ice.
Actions
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 12 (2d6+5) piercing damage, and the whelp can drag a grappled target 5 feet toward water.
Reactions
Wake Spray. When an ally within 10 feet is hit by a ranged attack, the whelp lashes the water; the attacker has disadvantage on its next attack roll before the end of its next turn.
A young serpent, scarcely longer than a rowboat, that has imprinted on a chosen handler and shadows them like a loyal hound of the depths.
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 from below with Surge from the Deep against whoever has not acted, bite-and-grapple the softest target, then use Drag Under to haul them toward the edge of the water. Kill-priority is any caster standing near the shoreline. Run it as a single ambush threat for a low-level party near a lake or flooded ruin.
Erupt on round one with advantage, bite the front-liner to grapple, then Tail-sweep to knock the rest prone and split them up. When it grabs a victim, Drag Under immediately and submerge so melee cannot follow into deep water. Pair it with a bigger flagship threat or a few Loch-Whelps and a watery lair; it is a brutal add-on, not a lone boss.
Use it as the lair monster of a drowned hall: it surges, bites to grapple, and Drags Under to isolate one PC per round in the deep dark. Kill-priority is whoever can teleport or breathe water and follow it down. Pair it with minions and lair hazards (currents, freezing water); the serpent harries while the bigger threat presses, never standing alone against a high-tier party.
Put Lochness 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 Lochness Monster?
Its home tier is CR 6 (Tier 2, party levels 5-10): AC 15, 138 HP, +7 to hit, save DC 15. The record also gives drop-in Tier 1 (CR ~2) and Tier 3 (CR ~11) lines with the same traits and only the numbers shifted.
Can Lochness Monster be a companion or ally?
The adult is an unaligned wild beast, not a tame ally, but the bundled Loch-Whelp, Bound (AC 14, 82 HP) works as a beast companion — a slick young serpent that grapples, drags foes toward water, and spoils incoming ranged attacks for an ally.
Is the Lochness Monster a solo boss?
No. It has a strong grapple-and-drag kit but no legendary actions, so a four-player party out-acts it. Run it as an ambush threat or as an add-on beside a larger flagship monster and a watery lair rather than as a one-on-four centerpiece.
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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