Tsathoggua
Tsathoggua — The Encounter
The Sleeping Toad-God, glutton of the lightless deep · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Tsathoggua
In the black gulf of N'kai, where no sun has ever reached, the toad-god dreams upon a throne of the devoured. The old grimoires name it the Sleeper, for it moves seldom and slowly, yet hunger never leaves it. Those who descend to its lightless temple find offerings stacked about its bulk: bones picked clean, idols of black onyx, the husks of priests who served and were eaten all the same. It rewards worship not with mercy but with appetite, sending dreams of cold abundance to those who would feed it. Sorcerers prize it, for its formless servants can be commanded to fetch and to slay, but the bargain is always lopsided. To stand before the toad-god is to feel one's will grow heavy as silt, the limbs slow, the mind drowsing toward the wide and patient mouth. It need not hurry. It has outwaited stars.
Run Tsathoggua in Sixty Seconds
- It does not chase. Tsathoggua is a sit-and-swallow boss. Stay on or near its skull-mound, let the party come, and make each turn about defending its grapple, not advancing.
- Open with Bite. Grapple the heaviest melee PC, then use Engulf or a follow-up Bite to swallow them at 0 HP. A swallowed PC is the whole fight.
- Kill-priority is the gullet. The party must deal 25+ from inside to force a regurgitation, so spend your legendary Lashes and Sluggish Lunge cutting down whoever tries to dig the victim out.
- When bloodied (97 HP), lean on Drowsing Whisper every round to halve rescuers' speed and stack Dream Pall disadvantage; the longer it stalls, the more acid the gullet does.
- Three ways to run it: lair sentinel (alone on its hoard, dream-luring intruders), cult centerpiece (with the Formless Spawn and chanting acolytes), or a slow dungeon dread that the party must out-maneuver rather than out-DPS.
Tsathoggua
Huge aberration, neutral evil
CR 11 · 7,200 XP · GUIDELINETorpid Bulk. Tsathoggua is sluggish but immense. It has advantage on saving throws against being moved or knocked prone, and a creature that hits it with a melee attack while within 5 ft. is marked as prey until the end of Tsathoggua's next turn (it knows their location, ignoring cover).
Devouring Gullet. Signature. When Tsathoggua reduces a creature to 0 hit points with its Bite, it may immediately swallow that creature. A swallowed creature is blinded and restrained, has total cover, and takes 14 (4d6) acid damage at the start of each of Tsathoggua's turns. If Tsathoggua takes 25+ damage in a single turn from a creature inside it, it regurgitates all swallowed creatures (prone, within 10 ft.).
Dream Pall. Creatures that start their turn within 15 ft. of Tsathoggua must succeed on a DC 16 Wisdom save or have disadvantage on their next attack roll, lulled by its narcotic, ancient presence.
Actions
Multiattack. Tsathoggua makes one Bite attack and two Claw attacks.
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 24 (3d12 + 5) piercing damage, and if the target is a creature it is grappled (escape DC 16).
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (2d8 + 6) slashing damage.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Sluggish Lunge (Reaction). When a creature Tsathoggua can see ends its movement within 10 ft. of it, Tsathoggua makes one Claw attack against that creature.
Legendary Actions (3/Round)
Legendary Actions. Tsathoggua can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature's turn. It regains spent actions at the start of its turn.
Lash (1 action). Tsathoggua makes one Claw attack.
Drowsing Whisper (1 action). One creature within 30 ft. must succeed on a DC 16 Wisdom save or take 9 (2d8) psychic damage and have its speed halved until the end of its next turn.
Engulf (2 actions). Tsathoggua makes a Bite attack against a creature already grappled by it; on a hit, the target also makes a DC 16 Strength save or is pulled into reach and swallowed if at 0 hit points.
A mountain of toad-like, batwing-eared flesh squats upon a cairn of gnawed skulls, its tusked maw yawning wide above folds of rubbery, slime-slicked hide. It does not chase; it waits, and what it waits for always, eventually, comes to it.
Tsathoggua, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEAmorphous (signature). The spawn can move through a space as narrow as 1 inch wide without squeezing, and has advantage on saving throws against effects that would grapple or restrain it.
Actions
Pseudopod. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 17 (3d8 + 4) bludgeoning damage plus 7 (2d6) acid damage.
Reactions
Smother. When a creature within 5 ft. hits the spawn with a melee attack, the spawn flows around the attacker, who must succeed on a DC 14 Dexterity save or be grappled (escape DC 14).
A puddle of inky, ever-shifting protoplasm sent up from N'kai to do the Sleeper's errands, taking and discarding shapes as it slides.
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 it as a temple-guardian horror, not a slayer: it sits on its skull-mound and swallows the first PC who closes. Open with Bite to grapple, then keep that victim in the gullet while Claws fend off rescuers. Kill-priority for the party is freeing the swallowed PC; deal 25+ to its insides to force a regurgitation.
Anchor an encounter with the Formless Spawn and a few cultists feeding it. Open with Dream Pall pressure, Bite the front-liner to grapple-and-swallow, and use Sluggish Lunge to punish anyone darting past. Make casters waste turns on the swallowed ally; the spawn smothers ranged attackers at the back.
Native boss. Open by Biting to grapple, Engulf (legendary) to swallow, then sit and digest while Drowsing Whisper slows would-be rescuers. Spend legendary Lashes on anyone who frees the swallowed PC; the maw is the win condition, so the party must commit damage to its innards. Pair with the Formless Spawn to lock down flankers and the gullet stays full.
Put Tsathoggua 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 Tsathoggua?
At its native Tier 3 it is CR 11 (7,200 XP): AC 17, 195 HP, +9 to hit, save DC 16. It is solo-capable thanks to 3 legendary actions and the Sluggish Lunge reaction, so its sheet sits one band low on purpose — the action economy makes it play up. Scale it down to the Tier 1 or Tier 2 lines for lower-level parties; traits stay identical, only the numbers move.
Can Tsathoggua be a companion or ally?
The toad-god itself is too vast and self-serving to follow anyone, but its servant — the Formless Spawn, Bound — makes a fine summoned ally or sorcerous familiar: AC 14, 117 HP, an amorphous body that squeezes through any gap, a damaging Pseudopod, and a Smother reaction that grapples attackers.
Is Tsathoggua safe to use without D&D IP concerns?
Yes. Tsathoggua originates with Clark Ashton Smith and the wider Lovecraftian public-domain mythos as the toad-god sleeper of N'kai, framed here through that folklore and grimoire tradition. It is statted as a generic SRD aberration with SRD-only spells, conditions, and terms — no proprietary D&D cosmology, ranks, or named places.
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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