Stone Monkey
Stone Monkey — The Encounter
Born of the heaven-born stone, veined with living fire · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Stone Monkey
Of the marvels recorded in the chronicles of the eastern mountains, none is stranger than the monkey that had no mother and no sire. Upon a lonely peak there sat a great egg of stone, swollen for unnumbered ages with the breath of heaven and the patience of earth, until at last it split and out leaped a monkey wrought wholly of rock, fire running in the seams of its flesh. It bowed to the four quarters and the light of its eyes is said to have startled the very palaces of the sky. Untaught and unbound, it knew neither death's tally nor any master's rod, and it ruled the beasts of its mountain by strength and laughter alike. Sages warn that the creature is not wicked but wilful: it will share fruit with a guest and shatter a wall in the same hour. Bind it with kindness and riddles, for chains it merely breaks, and fire it drinks like wine.
Run Stone Monkey in Sixty Seconds
- It is fast, not durable — speed 40, climb 40, and a 30-ft Stone-Leap bonus action every turn mean it picks the fight, so never let players assume the front line protects the backline.
- Open by leaping the wall — first turn, Stone-Leap past the tanks into the caster or healer, Multiattack to knock prone, then grapple with the tail next round.
- When bloodied it gets HOTTER — Molten Veins escalates from once-per-turn to every melee hit, so a bloodied monkey bouncing through clustered PCs is the real damage spike; spread out.
- Three ways to run it — solo skirmisher harassing a backline, a flanker paired with a slower boss, or a pack leader with the Cinder-Ape companion and minion apes.
- It breaks chains, not bargains — immune to petrified/poisoned and shrugs off charm/fear/sleep, so social or restraint plans fail; players win by out-positioning or by answering its riddle.
Stone Monkey
Medium elemental, chaotic neutral
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINEStone-Born Vigor. The stone monkey has advantage on saving throws against being charmed, frightened, or paralyzed, and any spell or effect that would put it to sleep fails.
Molten Veins. Signature. Fire runs in the cracks of its stone flesh. The first time each turn the monkey hits a creature with a melee attack, that creature takes an extra 7 (2d6) fire damage. While the monkey is bloodied, this fire spreads: the extra damage applies on every melee hit, not just the first.
Actions
Multiattack. The stone monkey makes two Stone Fist attacks. If both hit the same target, the target must succeed on a DC 14 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.
Stone Fist. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8 + 4) bludgeoning damage.
Lashing Tail. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 10 (1d10 + 4) bludgeoning damage, and the target is grappled (escape DC 14) if it is Large or smaller. The monkey can grapple one creature this way at a time.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Stone-Leap (Bonus Action). The stone monkey jumps up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space it can see, ignoring difficult terrain. This movement does not provoke opportunity attacks.
Rolling Stone (Reaction). When the monkey takes damage from an attack, it can move up to 10 feet without provoking opportunity attacks.
A roaring man-shape of grey stone, its cracks lit from within by veins of restless fire, tail lashing as it bursts from shattered bedrock. It moves like quicksilver despite its mineral bulk.
Stone Monkey, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEEmber Hide (signature). When a creature within 5 feet hits the cinder-ape with a melee attack, that creature takes 4 (1d8) fire damage from the sparks of its cracked stone skin.
Actions
Smoldering Fist. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage plus 4 (1d8) fire damage.
Reactions
Shield the Pack. When an ally the cinder-ape can see within 10 feet is hit by an attack, it can leap in the way, taking half the damage itself and granting the ally resistance to that instance of damage.
A smaller stone-born ape, its grin perpetual and its knuckles smoking, loyal to whoever first answered its riddle.
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 Stone-Leap into the squishiest caster, then two Stone Fists to knock it prone. Kill-priority: anything that can't take a punch. Pair it with skirmisher beasts or a small ape pack so it always has a flank to leap to.
Open by leaping past the front line and Multiattacking the backline to drop a target prone, then grapple the healer with Lashing Tail. When bloodied its Molten Veins spread, so let it bounce between bunched PCs with Stone-Leap each turn. Pairs with a bigger lair-bound threat as the mobile harasser, not a solo.
Use it as the agile bruiser flanking a heavier boss or guarding a lair's chokepoint. Leap-and-grapple a key PC each round and burn them with fire while the main threat does the heavy lifting. Kill-priority for the party should be the boss, so reward them for ignoring this one at their peril.
Put Stone Monkey 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 Stone Monkey?
Natively CR 6 (Tier 2, ~level 5-10), a 2,300-XP elemental skirmisher. The block also scales down to a ~CR 2 Tier 1 version and up to a ~CR 11 Tier 3 version using the same traits and actions, only the numbers shift.
Can Stone Monkey be a companion or ally?
Yes. Use the bound Cinder-Ape companion (AC 14, 76 HP) — a smaller stone-born ape that bodyguards allies with Shield the Pack and burns attackers with its Ember Hide. It suits a fire-touched ranger, a monk who tamed it with a riddle, or any party that bested it and earned its loyalty.
Is Stone Monkey a solo boss?
No. It has no legendary actions and no lair kit, so a four-player party will out-act it over a full fight. Run it as a fast harasser beside a bigger threat, or in a pack — its job is to make the backline panic, not to soak a whole party's turns.
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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