Ragnvald Blightbeard
Ragnvald Blightbeard — The Encounter
Plague-cursed reaver of the frozen fjords, his maul drips rot · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Ragnvald Blightbeard
Ragnvald was a raider-jarl of the fog-choked northern fjords, a brute of giant-blood who took every shore by storm until a curse settled in his marrow. They say he plundered a sea-witch's barrow and woke clutching her plague-rune; from that night his beard wept and would not heal, and the wound became a weapon. He does not die of the rot. It feeds him. Each man he fells swells black and bursts, and Ragnvald drinks the dying breath like mead. Villages along the cold coast bar their doors at the smell of him before the sails are even sighted, for where Blightbeard makes landfall the wells turn foul and the cattle drop in the fields. He fights without fear of wound or death, certain the pestilence in him outlasts any blade, and laughs as it does its work for him.
Run Ragnvald Blightbeard in Sixty Seconds
- He's a bruiser, not a boss. Ragnvald has no legendary actions, run him as the heavy that lands beside a flagship threat and bulldozes the front line.
- Open with Rot-Hurl. If the party is clustered, throw the festering clot first for AoE poison and difficult terrain, then charge in.
- Reckless is a knob, not a default. Turn it on when you need the kill and the party can't punish him hard, turn it off when he's low and exposed.
- When bloodied, lean on the rot. His Pestilence aura and Savage Surge mean dying PCs make things worse, push him into the cluster and let corpses spread the poison.
- Three ways to run him: mindless plague-engine that always charges nearest, cunning reaver who targets the healer, or a curse-vector who fights to make as many creatures poisoned as possible before he falls.
Ragnvald Blightbeard
Medium humanoid (giant-kin), chaotic evil
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINEReckless. At the start of his turn, Ragnvald can gain advantage on all melee weapon attack rolls during that turn, but attack rolls against him have advantage until the start of his next turn.
Blightbeard's Pestilence. Signature. Ragnvald exhales a fog of rot from his beard. Any creature that ends its turn within 5 feet of him must succeed on a DC 14 Constitution saving throw or be poisoned until the end of its next turn. A creature poisoned this way that is reduced to 0 hit points becomes a festering host: the rot spreads, dealing 7 (2d6) poison damage to one creature within 5 feet of the corpse.
Actions
Multiattack. Ragnvald makes two attacks with his plague-maul.
Plague-Maul. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8 + 4) bludgeoning damage plus 4 (1d8) poison damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 14 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
Rot-Hurl (Recharge 5-6). Ragnvald hurls a clot of festering filth at a point within 30 feet. Each creature in a 10-foot radius must make a DC 14 Constitution saving throw, taking 18 (4d8) poison damage on a failure, or half as much on a success. The ground in that radius becomes difficult terrain until the start of his next turn.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Savage Surge. When Ragnvald reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, he can move up to half his speed and make one Plague-Maul attack as a bonus action.
A towering, green-fleshed reaver in scavenged plate, his braided beard caked with weeping sores, swinging a runed two-handed maul slick with infectious filth. He grins through broken tusks as the rot that consumes him is loosed upon all he strikes.
Ragnvald Blightbeard, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEPlague-Scent (signature). Ragnvald Blightbeard has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on smell and on attacks against any creature that is poisoned.
Actions
Rotting Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) piercing damage plus 4 (1d8) poison damage.
Reactions
Pack Drag. When an ally hits a creature within 5 feet of Ragnvald Blightbeard, the hound can use its reaction to attempt to knock that creature prone (DC 14 Strength save).
A mangy war-hound matted with sores, loosed ahead of the raiders to run down the sick and the slow.
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 charging the softest target and going Reckless to slam them prone, then ride them down with Multiattack. Use Rot-Hurl on a cluster the moment it recharges. He is the front-line bruiser, not a thinker, pair him with a caster or jarl who directs the fight.
Open Rot-Hurl into the densest knot of PCs, then wade in Reckless and maul the lowest-AC striker prone. Kill-priority is whoever he can drop, Savage Surge lets one kill cascade into a second attack and his Pestilence rots the corpse-cluster. Pair him as the muscle beside a control caster or boss, he wants enemies bunched and bloodied.
Lead with Rot-Hurl to seed difficult terrain, then Reckless-charge the healer or controller and pin them prone. Let Savage Surge chain kills through the back line while the poison aura grinds anyone who closes. Run him as a melee anchor for a tougher centerpiece, he punishes clustering, not lone duels.
Put Ragnvald Blightbeard 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 Ragnvald Blightbeard?
Natively CR 6 (Tier 2, levels 5-10): AC 16, 127 HP, +7 to hit, save DC 14. Scaled stat lines are provided for Tier 1 (~CR 2) and Tier 3 (~CR 11) so you can drop him into any party without re-math.
Can Ragnvald be a companion or ally?
He's built as an adversary and an add-on, not a solo boss (no legendary actions), so pair him with a bigger threat. If you want a friendly version, reflavor him as a cursed berserker mercenary, but his Pestilence aura makes him a hazard to stand near, so keep allies at range.
Is the poison aura too punishing at low tiers?
At Tier 1 it's DC 12 and the poisoned condition only lasts a round, so it's a soft tax rather than a death sentence. If your table finds the corpse-spread effect swingy, simply drop the 2d6 secondary damage and keep the aura as a control tool.
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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