Velnias
Velnias — The Encounter
Horned Lord of the Underworld Earth and Cattle · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Velnias
Beneath plowed field and grazing pasture there is older ground, and Velnias holds the deed to it. The Balts knew him as the horned keeper of the dead and the herder of unseen cattle, a chthonic lord who measured wealth in beasts and souls alike. He bargains in the dark of barrows: a cow gone lame, a bog that swallows the careless, a wager won by a trick. Where the thunder-god strikes from above, Velnias answers from below, and the two have quarreled since the world was furrowed. He is no liar so much as a hard creditor, and every oath sworn over buried bone is one he will collect. Cunning folk left him milk at crossroads and the roots of the threshold; the wise feared to mock him, for the underworld earth hears, and what the earth takes it keeps. To meet him in the open is to learn that the ground itself can be his hand.
Run Velnias in Sixty Seconds
- Read the ground: Velnias is strongest on dirt, root, and bog. On natural ground he heals 10 at the start of each turn (not in sunlight) and shrugs off a death blow once per day, so fight him on stone or in daylight if you can.
- Open with the pull: Lead every fight by hooking the enemy front-liner 10 ft. out of their wall with the spear, then hammer the exposed target twice. Isolation first, damage second.
- Kill-priority: drop whoever can clear difficult terrain or counter the restrain (a caster with movement or freedom magic). Until that's gone, Underworld Pull will keep pinning your party.
- When bloodied: he plants on his ground and leans on Chthonic Vigor and the Shield reaction, trading turns to out-heal you. Spike him hard in one round or drag him off natural earth to deny the regen.
- Three ways to run him: a lone hard creditor stalking a barrow; the antlered field-marshal of a root-and-bog lair full of beasts and barrow-dead; or the chthonic lieutenant paired with a bigger storm-god or death-lord boss.
Velnias
Medium fiend (devil), neutral evil
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINELord of Cattle and Mire. Difficult terrain of root, bog, or churned earth costs Velnias no extra movement, and he has advantage on saving throws against being grappled or restrained. Beasts will not willingly attack him.
Chthonic Vigor. While standing on natural ground, Velnias regains 10 hit points at the start of each of his turns unless he is in sunlight. If he drops to 0 hit points on his ground, he instead drops to 1 hit point (once per day).
Actions
Multiattack. Velnias makes two attacks with his Cattle-Goad Spear, or one spear attack and uses Underworld Pull.
Cattle-Goad Spear. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 16 (3d8 + 4) piercing damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 15 Strength saving throw or be pulled 10 feet toward Velnias.
Underworld Pull (Recharge 5-6). Velnias drives his spear into the earth and roots erupt in a 15-foot radius around a point he can see within 60 feet. Each creature in that area must make a DC 15 Strength saving throw, taking 22 (4d10) bludgeoning damage and being restrained until the end of its next turn on a failure, or half as much damage and not restrained on a success.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Shield of the Old Faith. Reaction: When a creature Velnias can see hits him with an attack, he raises his oaken shield to gain a +3 bonus to AC against that attack, possibly causing it to miss.
A grim antlered god in scale armor, one fist closed on a long cattle-goad spear and the other braced behind a great round oaken shield carved with a sun-wheel. A wolf's skull hangs at his belt and dead roots claw up from the earth at his heels.
Velnias, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEHerder of the Unseen (signature). Allies within 10 feet of Velnias ignore difficult terrain made of root, mud, or bog, and beasts have disadvantage on attack rolls against them.
Actions
Cattle-Goad Spear. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8 + 4) piercing damage, and Velnias may pull the target 5 feet toward an ally.
Reactions
Oaken Guard. When an adjacent ally is hit by an attack, Velnias interposes his shield and grants that ally a +3 bonus to AC against the triggering attack.
Pledged by buried oath, the horned god walks at your shoulder, his spear hooking foes off their feet and his great shield always angled toward the one beside him.
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 goading the front-liner 10 feet out of formation with the spear, then jab the isolated target twice. Save Underworld Pull for when two or more PCs cluster on a chokepoint. Pair him with mire beasts or barrow-wights so something covers him while Chthonic Vigor heals back chip damage.
Lead with the spear's pull to drag the squishiest caster into reach, then commit Multiattack to it; kill-priority is whoever can dispel his root terrain. Drop Underworld Pull the instant the party bunches to restrain and soften two or three at once. Keep him on natural ground for the turn-start healing and burn his Shield reaction on the biggest incoming hit.
Run him as the field-marshal of a lair, not alone: stake him in rooted, boggy terrain surrounded by his unseen cattle and barrow-dead so the action economy holds. Open with Underworld Pull on the densest knot, then spear the restrained casters. Pair him with a bigger flagship threat (a storm-god rival or a death-lord) and let Velnias control the ground while the boss deals the killing blows.
Put Velnias 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 Velnias?
Natively CR 6 (Tier 2, ~2,300 XP) as a Medium fiend warrior-god. The stat block scales to CR 2 for levels 1-4 and roughly CR 11 for levels 11-15; the traits and actions stay identical, only AC, HP, to-hit, save DC, and damage move between the bands.
Can Velnias be a companion or ally?
Yes. The 'Velnias, Bound' companion sheet (AC 16, 76 HP) makes him a protective controller for one PC: he hooks foes off their feet, smooths root and bog terrain for allies, and throws his oaken shield over whoever stands beside him.
Is Velnias solo-capable as a boss?
Not on his own. He has no legendary actions and only a single defensive reaction, so a four-player party will out-act him. Run him as an add-on or field-marshal alongside minions, a beast-and-barrow lair, or a larger flagship boss rather than as a lone centerpiece.
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
Played Velnias at your table? Log in with your Obsidian Tavern account to leave a balance note, a war story, or a file issue — the sharpest reports get the block revised.
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