Taotie
Taotie — The Encounter
The Devouring Maw, gluttony given horns and hide · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Taotie
In the old bronzes of the eastern dynasties its face was cast on cauldron and wine vessel alike, a warning sculpted into the very tools of feasting: this is the spirit of gluttony, the eater that cannot be filled. The grimoires name it Taotie, fourth of the unruly progeny of antiquity, a creature so ravenous it is said to have devoured its own body until only the great head and devouring maw remained, then hungered still. Smiths carved its likeness as a ward, reasoning that a thing so greedy would consume any lesser evil that crept toward the hearth. Where it walks, granaries empty and herds vanish in a night, and the ground is left scoured to bare stone. It knows no satiety, no mercy, no purpose but to swallow. To bargain with it is folly; it hears only the gnawing in its own belly, and would eat the bargainer mid-sentence.
Run Taotie in Sixty Seconds
- Hold the maw The Taotie wins by removing one PC from the fight: get two claws on a Large-or-smaller target, Bite, and that creature is Swallowed — Blinded, Restrained, taking 3d6 acid each round.
- Open aggressive Ravenous Lunge (2 legendary actions) into the squishiest backliner turn one; you want a caster Grappled and swallowed before initiative resets.
- Kill-priority is the wounded Insatiable Hunger gives advantage against anyone below max HP and heals the Taotie 10 when its bite drops a target — chase the bloodied, never the fresh tank.
- When bloodied It does not flee; gluttony has no fear. Keep a creature swallowed for the free heal and lean on Carapace of Bronze (-5 to the first melee hit each turn) to outlast the burst.
- Three ways to run it (1) Devourer — fixate on swallowing one PC and digesting; (2) Skirmisher — Lunge, bite, retreat 40 ft., let no one pin it; (3) Lair tyrant — anchor it in a flame-ringed den with minions and use legendary Tail Lash to control the floor.
Taotie
Huge monstrosity, chaotic evil
CR 8 · 3,900 XP · GUIDELINEInsatiable Hunger. The taotie has advantage on attack rolls against any creature it has Grappled, and against any creature below its hit point maximum in hit points. Whenever it reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a bite, the taotie regains 10 hit points and its hunger drives it onward.
Carapace of Bronze. The first time each turn the taotie is hit by a melee attack, it reduces the damage by 5 (to a minimum of 0) as the blow glances off its ridged spiked hide.
Actions
Multiattack. The taotie makes one Bite attack and two Claw attacks. If both claws hit the same target, that target is Grappled (escape DC 16).
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 17 (2d12 + 6) piercing damage. If the target is a Large or smaller creature and is Grappled by the taotie, it is also Swallowed (see Swallow).
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d6 + 6) slashing damage.
Swallow. A Swallowed creature is Blinded and Restrained, has total cover against attacks from outside the taotie, and takes 10 (3d6) acid damage at the start of each of the taotie's turns. The taotie can have only one creature swallowed at a time. If the taotie takes 20 damage or more on a single turn from the swallowed creature, the taotie must succeed on a DC 16 Constitution saving throw at the end of that turn or regurgitate the creature, which falls prone within 5 feet of the taotie.
Legendary Actions (3/Round)
Legendary Actions. The taotie can take 2 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature's turn. The taotie regains spent legendary actions at the start of its turn.
Tail Lash. The taotie swings its spiked tail. Each creature within 10 feet must succeed on a DC 16 Dexterity saving throw or take 11 (2d6 + 4) slashing damage and be knocked Prone.
Ravenous Lunge (Costs 2 Actions). The taotie moves up to its speed without provoking opportunity attacks and makes one Bite attack against a creature it ends adjacent to.
A Huge horned glutton-beast of bronze-ridged hide hunches over a ring of carved flame, hooked tusks framing a maw that has never known fullness. Every spike of its carapace seems angled to drag prey toward that endless mouth.
Taotie, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEDevourer's Boon (signature). While within 30 feet of the Taotie, your melee attacks against a creature you can see deal an extra 1d6 damage if that creature is below its hit point maximum, as the ward feeds on weakness alongside you.
Actions
Hooked Tusk. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) piercing damage, and the target is pulled 5 feet toward the ward.
Reactions
Glutton's Greed. When a creature within 5 feet of the Taotie is reduced to 0 hit points, the ward feeds and you regain 1d6 hit points.
A lesser glutton-spirit chained to your service, all jaw and ridge, that hungers when you strike and grows bold around the wounded.
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 closing 40 ft. and clawing the nearest squishy caster to Grapple, then Bite to drag it down. If two PCs cluster, lead with Tail Lash to knock them Prone. Kill-priority: anyone already bloodied — Insatiable Hunger gives advantage and a heal. Pair with a swarm of lesser beasts as the hungry alpha.
Open by Lunging into the backline and Swallowing the lowest-AC target — that creature is now out of the fight and feeding the boss. If the party clusters to free their ally, sweep Tail Lash for prone. Kill-priority: the swallowed PC's rescuers, then the next bloodied target; spend legendary actions to keep biting on others' turns.
Run it as a lair centerpiece amid a ring of carved flame and lesser glutton-spirits, not a lone duel. Open with a Swallow on the healer, then Tail Lash anyone who rushes to dig them out. Pair it with a bigger threat or a horde of minions so its action economy compounds; kill-priority is always the most-wounded creature, which it heals off of.
Put Taotie 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 Taotie?
Natively CR 8 (3,900 XP) at Tier 2, tuned for a 5th-10th level party. Because it carries a real solo kit — two legendary actions plus a Swallow lock — it plays up a band, so it can anchor a fight that would otherwise read as CR 9-10. Scale it to CR 2 for Tier 1 or roughly CR 11 for Tier 3 using the provided tier rows.
Can Taotie be a companion or ally?
The full Taotie is a boss adversary, but yes — the bundled Glutton-Ward companion is a lesser glutton-spirit bound to a player or NPC. It hungers alongside you (extra damage versus wounded foes), drags targets in with its tusk, and heals you when something dies nearby, without overshadowing a party as a controllable ally.
How do I beat the Swallow without losing a player?
Deal 20+ damage to the Taotie in a single turn from inside or out and it must make a DC 16 Constitution save or regurgitate the swallowed creature prone beside it. Focus fire, hand the swallowed PC a way to deal damage from within (it has total cover but can still attack the stomach), and force that save fast — it only swallows one creature at a time.
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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