Balawis
Balawis — The Encounter
Three-fanged serpent-terror of the drowned mangroves · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Balawis
In the drowned mangroves where the river forgets the sea, the Balawis waits with three heads asleep above the tideline. The old fisherfolk say it was once a single great water-snake that swallowed a sorcerer whole; the sorcerer's curse split the beast's neck into three and bound it to deathlessness, so that no spear-cut ever truly takes. Strike a head from its shoulders and two more rise hissing in its place, dripping the green of crushed leaves and old blood. Only fire — the one thing the swamp denies it — can seal a severed neck before it sprouts anew. Villages that vanish in a single night are blamed on it; what is found after is a churned channel, splintered bancas, and a wide smear of venom-blackened reeds. Hunters who survive speak of three pairs of yellow eyes opening one after another, and of a smell like a struck match that never came.
Run Balawis in Sixty Seconds
- Heads are the whole fight — at 25+ damage in a turn a head drops, but two regrow at end of turn unless someone dealt fire damage since its last turn. No fire, no progress.
- Open submerged — start it under the brackish water (Hold Breath, swim 40 ft.), surface for a three-Bite Multiattack the party can't pre-empt.
- Kill-priority is the casters — use Coil and Drag (legendary) to yank a back-liner into the water, then gang Bites on them; Reactive Heads give it extra opportunity attacks if they flee.
- When bloodied, lean on Venom Spray — recharge it onto whoever clustered to focus-fire, the poisoned condition stacking onto their next turn.
- Three ways to run it: swamp-stalker ambush boss (T3 solo), a regrowing puzzle-monster that punishes no-fire parties, or a pair with its Spawnling for a brood encounter.
Balawis
Huge monstrosity, neutral evil
CR 9 · 5,000 XP · GUIDELINEHold Breath. Balawis can hold its breath for 1 hour while submerged in the mangrove channels it haunts.
Multiple Heads. Balawis has three heads. While it has more than one head, it has advantage on saving throws against being blinded, charmed, deafened, frightened, stunned, and knocked unconscious.
Reactive Heads. For each head Balawis has beyond one, it gets an extra reaction that can be used only for opportunity attacks.
Riven Crown. Signature. Whenever Balawis takes 25 or more damage in a single turn, one of its heads dies. If all its heads die, Balawis dies. At the end of its turn, it grows two heads for each head that died since its last turn, unless it has taken fire damage since its last turn. Balawis regains 10 hit points for each head regrown in this way.
Actions
Multiattack. Balawis makes as many Bite attacks as it has heads.
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8+5) piercing damage.
Venom Spray (Recharge 5-6). Each head exhales caustic venom in a 15-foot cone. Each creature in any cone must make a DC 16 Constitution saving throw, taking 21 (6d6) poison damage on a failed save, or half as much on a success. A creature that fails the save is also poisoned until the end of its next turn.
Legendary Actions (3/Round)
Detect. Balawis makes a Wisdom (Perception) check.
Lashing Bite (Costs 1 Action). Balawis makes one Bite attack with one head.
Coil and Drag (Costs 2 Actions). Balawis lashes its tail at one creature within 15 feet. The target must succeed on a DC 16 Strength saving throw or be pulled 10 feet toward Balawis and knocked prone.
Three dragon-fanged serpent heads rear from a single muscled coil, fins flared and jaws agape, the body still half-wound around a sunken cypress stump in the brackish water.
Balawis, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINELesser Heads (signature). Balawis has two heads and has advantage on saving throws against being blinded, charmed, deafened, frightened, stunned, and knocked unconscious while both remain.
Actions
Twin Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6+4) piercing damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 14 Constitution save or take 4 (1d8) poison damage.
Reactions
Whipping Coil. When a creature within 5 feet stands up from prone, Balawis makes one Twin Bite against it.
A half-grown brood-serpent of the same accursed bloodline, two heads instead of three, fierce but not yet deathless.
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 striking from the water so it gets all three Bites before the party reacts. Kill-priority is whichever head bites the squishiest target — but warn players a head grows back unless they land fire. At this tier scale the regrowth to 5 HP per head so it doesn't grind the table down; pair it with reeds or difficult terrain rather than other monsters.
Lead with Venom Spray on a clustered group, then Multiattack the wounded. The heads are the puzzle: chopping one without fire just feeds it more attacks next round. Drive the lesson home early so the party brings torches or fire spells. Solid solo against a party of five; add the Spawnling companion only if they outnumber it badly.
Run it as a deathless centerpiece. Open submerged, surface for full Multiattack, recharge Venom Spray onto the cluster, then spend legendary actions on Lashing Bite and Coil and Drag to isolate the healer in the water. Remind yourself: only fire stops a head regrowing, and 25+ damage in one turn lops one off — so the fight ends when the party realizes the trick, not before.
Put Balawis 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 Balawis?
Its native sheet is CR 9 (5,000 XP), a Tier 3 solo built for levels 11-15. The tiers array also gives drop-in CR-scaled versions for Tier 1 and Tier 2 so the same hydra works at any table.
Can Balawis be a companion or ally?
The adult is a neutral-evil monstrosity, not an ally — but its brood-spawn Tubig (AC 14, 90 HP) is provided as a companion/summon-scale serpent for a druid, ranger, or evil patron who can leash it.
How do you actually kill it?
Deal 25+ damage in a single turn to sever a head, and make sure someone has dealt fire damage that round so the neck can't sprout two replacements. Cut every head off in fire and the deathless curse finally breaks.
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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