Queen of Hearts
Queen of Hearts — The Encounter
Crowned Tyrant of the Looking-Glass Court Who Screams for Heads · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Queen of Hearts
She rules a garden no map remembers, where roses are painted red on pain of beheading and the very playing cards stand to attention. The Queen of Hearts keeps no law but her temper; her favourite phrase is a death sentence and her court has long since learned that to argue is to die. Folklore from the looking-glass kingdom holds that her power is not magic but absolute belief in her own decrees, so total that soldiers march to their executions without complaint and gardeners paint white roses crimson rather than face her voice. Some say she was once a chess-piece queen, set upon a steam-and-brass throne and given a heart she did not know how to use, ruling instead by terror. Wherever her scepter points, a sentence follows: croquet-mallets become weapons, hedgehog-balls become missiles, and every subject prays only that today she screams for someone else's head.
Run Queen of Hearts in Sixty Seconds
- She is a commander, not a brawler. The Queen wins by buffing her court and sentencing your backline — always run her with minions (card-soldiers, croquet beasts) or a bigger boss, never solo.
- Open with Sentence of the Court. Drop it on the strongest spellcaster turn one to frighten and soften them, then Royal Decree the next thing that fails a save to mark it for the whole court.
- Kill-priority = whoever she marks. Royal Decree gives all her allies advantage on a marked target; concentrate the soldiers' attacks there and fire Off With Their Heads! the instant a PC hits half HP.
- Sovereign Presence is your zoning tool. Anyone ending their turn within 20 ft. risks being unable to step away — use it to trap melee PCs in the soldier kill-box while she screams from safety.
- Three ways to run her: royal-court set-piece (Queen + ranks of card-soldiers), a duel with the Knave bodyguard, or a beheading-trial scene where she sentences a captured NPC and the party must intervene before Off With Their Heads! resolves.
Queen of Hearts
Medium humanoid (noble), lawful evil
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINESovereign Presence. The Queen is immune to being charmed or frightened, and any creature that ends its turn within 20 feet of her while she is conscious must succeed on a DC 14 Wisdom saving throw or be unable to willingly move away from her until the start of its next turn, cowed by her authority.
Royal Decree. Signature. Once per turn when the Queen sees a creature within 60 feet fail a saving throw against one of her effects, she may scream her sentence at it. The creature takes an extra 10 (3d6) psychic damage and is marked for execution until the end of the Queen's next turn; her court guards and croquet-soldiers have advantage on attacks against a marked creature.
Actions
Multiattack. The Queen makes two Scepter Strike attacks, or uses Sentence of the Court and makes one Scepter Strike attack.
Scepter Strike. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8+4) bludgeoning damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or be unable to speak (cannot cast spells with verbal components) until the end of its next turn.
Sentence of the Court (Recharge 5-6). The Queen points her heart-scepter and pronounces judgment on one creature she can see within 60 feet. The target must make a DC 15 Charisma saving throw. On a failure it takes 22 (5d6+5) psychic damage and is frightened of the Queen until the end of its next turn; on a success it takes half damage and is not frightened.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Off With Their Heads! (Reaction). When a creature the Queen can see within 30 feet is reduced to half its hit points or fewer, she may command her court to strike: one allied creature within 30 feet of the Queen may immediately make one weapon attack against that creature as a reaction.
Crowned with a cross-topped diadem and swallowed in a tower of court ruffles, this Looking-Glass tyrant levels a heart-headed scepter like a verdict waiting to fall. Her painted smile never reaches the eyes that have already counted your head among the fallen.
Queen of Hearts, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEStolen Tarts (signature). While within 30 feet of the Queen, the Knave has advantage on saving throws against being frightened, and the first time each turn an enemy is marked by Royal Decree the Knave may move up to 10 feet toward it without provoking opportunity attacks.
Actions
Halberd. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6+4) slashing damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 13 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
Reactions
Loyal to a Fault. When the Queen would take damage from an attack made by a creature within 5 feet of the Knave, the Knave may impose disadvantage on that attack.
A nervous card-soldier who stole the tarts and now serves out his sentence as the Queen's shield, terrified of her but more terrified of the alternative.
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 Sentence of the Court on the loudest spellcaster to frighten and silence them, then close with Scepter Strike. Use Off With Their Heads! the instant a PC drops to half so a guard piles on. Pair her with card-soldiers or croquet beasts — she is the commander, not the front line.
Stay centered so Sovereign Presence pins the melee against her while she sentences the backline. Kill-priority is whoever she marks with Royal Decree — funnel every ally attack there and trigger Off With Their Heads! on bloodied targets. She is an add-on boss: pair her with a bigger threat or a wave of soldiers so the party can't just dogpile the Queen.
Lead each round with Sentence of the Court to stack frightened, then Royal Decree the same target so the whole court executes it. Keep her ringed by minions so Sovereign Presence locks melee in place. Pair her with a heavier centerpiece monster; she multiplies a battlefield rather than holding it alone.
Put Queen of Hearts 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 Queen of Hearts?
Her native build is CR 6 (2,300 XP), tuned for a party of levels 5–10. The stat record also gives drop-in numbers for tier 1 (levels 1–4, around CR 2) and tier 3 (levels 11–15, around CR 11) — same traits and actions, only the numbers move.
Can Queen of Hearts be a companion or ally?
She is built as an adversary and a commander, but a party that wins her favour (or seizes her court) can field her as a patron-ally who issues a Royal Decree once per fight to mark an enemy for everyone to focus. The included Knave companion is the friendlier option for player use.
Is she solo_capable or an add-on?
Add-on. The Queen has no legendary actions and her whole kit assumes a court around her, so a lone Queen gets dogpiled fast. Always pair her with minions or a heavier centerpiece monster so her buffs and Off With Their Heads! reaction actually matter.
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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