The Heirophant
The Heirophant — The Encounter
Crowned shepherd of the dead, the fifth trump made flesh · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is The Heirophant
The fifth trump of the deck shows a crowned teacher between two pillars, hand raised to bestow doctrine upon those who kneel. This one took the lesson too far. In life he was a hierophant of an old mystery cult, keeper of the rites that bridge the living and the buried, and he came to believe that death was merely the deepest sacrament a soul could receive. When plague hollowed his congregation he did not mourn them; he ordained them. Now he reigns over a sunken chapel where the faithful never truly leave, their hands forever reaching from the consecrated soil to support his throne. He preaches still, in a tongue that loosens the seals on graves, and each corpse that rises is, to his mind, a convert saved. To break him is not to kill a man but to silence a doctrine, for so long as the dead believe, the Heirophant cannot wholly die.
Run The Heirophant in Sixty Seconds
- Read the room first. The Heirophant heals 10 HP every time one of his undead dies near him (Throne of the Faithful Dead), so as long as the mound of dead is full he is functionally unkillable. Clear the adds before you commit to the boss.
- Open with Channel the Grave. The 30-foot cone hits clustered PCs for ~27 necrotic AND heals every undead in it. Make the party choose between spreading out (slow) and eating the cone (painful).
- Kill-priority for the party is the undead, then him. Tell your players this out loud through Sermon of Dread flavor; a smart table will pivot to the minions, which is exactly the puzzle you want.
- When bloodied, lean on reactions. Word of Binding restrains the biggest threat each time it acts, and Grasp of the Mound (2 legendary actions) locks down anyone trying to escape the consecrated soil.
- Three ways to run him: solo lair boss surrounded by his risen flock; a siege capstone with Acolytes buffing a horde; or a lower-tier set-piece using the Tier 1/2 numbers as a memorable graveyard guardian.
The Heirophant
Medium undead, lawful evil
CR 11 · 7,200 XP · GUIDELINEThrone of the Faithful Dead. Signature. While the Heirophant stands within 30 feet of three or more allied undead, it has advantage on saving throws and its spell save DC increases by 1. When an allied undead within 30 feet drops to 0 hit points, the Heirophant regains 10 hit points as their unspent devotion flows back into him.
Sermon of Dread. Any creature that starts its turn within 15 feet of the Heirophant and can hear his ceaseless liturgy must succeed on a DC 17 Wisdom save or have disadvantage on attack rolls until the start of its next turn. A creature that succeeds is immune to this trait for 24 hours.
Actions
Multiattack. The Heirophant uses Channel the Grave, then makes one Crozier Strike or casts a cantrip.
Crozier Strike. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 16 (3d8 + 3) necrotic damage, and the target cannot regain hit points until the start of the Heirophant's next turn.
Channel the Grave. The Heirophant raises both hands and exhales a wave of grave-cold. Each creature in a 30-foot cone must make a DC 17 Constitution save, taking 27 (6d8) necrotic damage on a failure, or half as much on a success. Each undead in the cone instead regains 9 (2d8) hit points.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Word of Binding (Reaction). When a creature the Heirophant can see within 60 feet hits with an attack or casts a spell, he speaks a syllable of dominion. The triggering creature must succeed on a DC 17 Charisma save or be restrained until the end of its next turn as unseen dead hands clutch at it.
Legendary Actions (3/Round)
Bless the Fallen. The Heirophant chooses one allied undead he can see within 60 feet. It gains 13 temporary hit points and advantage on its next attack roll.
Grasp of the Mound (Costs 2 Actions). Clawing hands erupt in a 10-foot-radius circle centered on a point within 60 feet. Each creature there must succeed on a DC 17 Strength save or be grappled (escape DC 17) and take 10 (3d6) necrotic damage.
Crozier Strike. The Heirophant makes one Crozier Strike attack.
A bearded patriarch in a triple-tiered crown stands amid the rubble of a fallen sanctum, arms spread in blessing as the drowned dead claw up from the earth at his feet, framed by a throne of stars and broken columns.
The Heirophant, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINELitany of the Open Grave (signature). Once per short rest, the Acolyte can spend an action to give an allied undead within 30 feet advantage on attacks and saves until the start of its next turn.
Actions
Censer Flail. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage plus 4 (1d8) necrotic damage.
Reactions
Interpose Devotion. When an ally within 5 feet is hit by an attack, the Acolyte takes half the damage instead.
A robed initiate chained at the wrist to one of the broken columns, chanting the Heirophant's sermons even as his own flesh greys toward the grave.
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 Channel the Grave on the clustered party, then hide behind risen dead and pelt the back line. Kill-priority is the Heirophant himself, but his Throne trait means you must clear the surrounding undead first or he keeps healing. Pair him with 3-4 skeletons or zombies as a mid-level set-piece.
Lead with Word of Binding to restrain the party's striker, then Channel the Grave to soften the line while healing his minions. Drop anyone who tries to flank past the grasping mound. Run him as a graveyard boss flanked by a horde of risen dead and one or two Acolytes.
Open with Channel the Grave to hit the cluster and top off his undead, then use legendary actions: Grasp of the Mound to pin runners and Bless the Fallen to keep an elite undead swinging. Word of Binding punishes the party's burst-damage turn; kill the surrounding dead to shut off his self-heal, then focus him. Best run solo with a lair full of corpses, or as the capstone of an undead siege alongside Acolytes.
Put The Heirophant 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 The Heirophant?
Natively CR 11 (Tier 3, levels 11-15) as a solo boss whose action-economy kit lets him play up a band. Scale him down with the Tier 1 (~CR 2) or Tier 2 (~CR 6) line for lower-level tables; the traits and actions stay identical, only the numbers move.
Can The Heirophant be a companion or ally?
He is built as an adversary, but the included Pillar-Bound Acolyte, Sworn (AC 14, 60 HP) is a ready-made ally or sidekick. As a companion, the Acolyte buffs allied undead and can interpose to take half damage for a friend in melee.
Why is the Heirophant undead rather than a living priest?
The render shows him rising from a mound of grasping corpses as their crowned shepherd, his flesh greyed and his sermon binding the dead to him. Statting him as undead makes his self-healing throne mechanic and necrotic theme land cleanly, and it fits the tarot Hierophant as the teacher who bridges the living and the buried.
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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