Dreadblood Ravegers
Dreadblood Ravegers — The Encounter
Black-mailed riders who reap the field upon dread skeletal steeds · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Dreadblood Ravegers
Where a battle has gone unburied, the dreadblood ravegers ride out from the carrion-soil. They were a household cavalry once, oath-sworn to a lord whose banner long since rotted; betrayed and ridden down on a field that drank their blood, they rose with that field in their veins. Now the loam itself is their fealty. Their mounts are not horses but the memory of horses, knit from barding and bleached bone, and they answer no spur but the smell of fresh dying. A ravager does not parley and cannot be routed, for it has already lost the only war it ever cared to win. It reaps in formation, knee to knee, glaive to glaive, and the dead it makes rise stumbling in its wake to swell the column. Folk who must cross such fields go on foot and stay low, for the ravegers hunt the upright and the mounted first, and a galloping silhouette upon the horizon is the last courtesy they offer.
Run Dreadblood Ravegers in Sixty Seconds
- Never stand still. The ravager's whole kit is the charge - move 20+ feet straight in, hit, then peel out and re-charge next round. Sitting in melee throws away its best damage.
- Open with Dreadblood Charge. Pick the closest fragile PC, knock them prone for the bonus 2d8 necrotic, then Multiattack into the downed target.
- Kill-priority: healers and casters. Drop one with melee and the Reaping Aura forces every ally within 10 ft. to save or be frightened - cripple the cluster, not just the kill.
- Reaction matters. Use Trampling Wheel when a melee PC whiffs or stands from prone for free hoof damage - it punishes anyone who tries to close.
- Three ways to run it: a lone mini-boss at low tiers; a knee-to-knee cavalry wing of 2-3 at native tier; the mobile shock arm of a larger undead horde at high tier - never a true solo.
Dreadblood Ravegers
Large undead, lawful evil
CR 6 · 2,300 XP · GUIDELINEDreadblood Charge. If the rider's mount moves at least 20 feet straight toward a target and the rider then hits it with a melee weapon attack on the same turn, the target takes an extra 9 (2d8) necrotic damage and must succeed on a DC 14 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone. The rider may not be dismounted by this attack's recoil.
Bound to the Saddle. While mounted, the rider has advantage on saving throws against being knocked prone or unwillingly dismounted. If the mount drops to 0 hit points, the rider lands on its feet within 5 feet and is not knocked prone.
Reaping Aura. When the rider reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, each enemy within 10 feet of the slain creature must succeed on a DC 14 Wisdom saving throw or be frightened of the rider until the end of its next turn.
Actions
Multiattack. The rider makes two attacks with its dread glaive.
Dread Glaive. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) slashing damage plus 4 (1d8) necrotic damage.
Hurled Spike. Ranged Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, range 20/60 ft., one target. Hit: 9 (1d8 + 4) piercing damage plus 4 (1d8) necrotic damage.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Trampling Wheel (Reaction). When a creature within 5 feet of the rider's mount fails an attack or stands up from prone, the mount makes one hooves attack against it: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 9 (2d4 + 4) bludgeoning damage.
A grave-pale knight sheathed in blackened plate and a tattered war-cloak, lance and glaive crossed, riding a barded skeletal destrier whose mane and tail bristle like frost-white blades. Beneath its riders the ground is a churn of cracked skulls and severed bone.
Dreadblood Ravegers, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEBonework Gallop (signature). The destrier ignores difficult terrain made of corpses, rubble, or bone, and opportunity attacks against it have disadvantage while it Dashes.
Actions
Hooves. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage.
Reactions
Shield the Rider. When its bonded ally is hit by an attack, the destrier may impose disadvantage on that attack roll by rearing into the blow.
A skeletal warhorse plated in black barding, its mane and tail spiking out in pale bone shards. It will carry a sworn ally tirelessly and trample any who close upon them.
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 the Dreadblood Charge to knock a front-liner prone, then glaive the prone target. If the party clusters, ride through the Reaping Aura so one kill scatters several with fear. A single ravager is a mini-boss at this tier; do not field more than one, and pair it with a few skeletons swept up in its wake.
Open by charging the squishiest reachable PC for the prone + necrotic spike, then Multiattack. Kill-priority is healers and casters so the Reaping Aura's fear lands on the cluster around them. Run two or three knee-to-knee as a cavalry wing; pair with a necromancer or grave-flagship who animates their kills.
Charge, prone, Multiattack, repeat - never sit still, kite back out and re-charge each round. Focus the lowest-AC backliner first and let Reaping Aura fear the rest. At this tier never run it solo: field a lance of three to five as the cavalry arm of a larger horde, screening a bigger undead threat or a lich-styled commander.
Put Dreadblood Ravegers 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 Dreadblood Ravegers?
The native build is CR 6 (2,300 XP), tuned for a party of levels 5-10. Scaled stat lines are provided for Tier 1 (levels 1-4, ~CR 2) and Tier 3 (levels 11-15, ~CR 11); the traits and actions stay identical and only the numbers move.
Can Dreadblood Ravegers be a companion or ally?
The rider itself is a sworn-undead adversary, but its mount works as an ally option: the Dread Destrier, Bound (AC 14, 71 HP) will carry a sworn ally tirelessly, ignore corpse-and-bone terrain, and rear into incoming blows to shield its rider with Shield the Rider.
Is this creature solo-boss material?
No. A ravager is a hit-and-run cavalry add-on, not a centerpiece - it has no legendary actions. Run a wing of two or three as the mobile arm of a horde, ideally paired with a necromancer or larger undead flagship that animates the kills they leave behind.
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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