Dreadbloods Heralds
Dreadbloods Heralds — The Encounter
Winged blood-drinker risen from the unburied dead · a boss your table can run with almost no prep. SRD 5.1-compatible.
Who Is Dreadbloods Heralds
The oldest tablets name this thing a herald of the unburied dead: a corpse denied rite and grave, swollen on the blood of those who left it to rot. Where the resentful spirit was once content to sicken the living from the shadows, generations of spilled offerings have bound and fattened it into a thing of wings and beak and endless thirst. It does not feed to live, for it cannot die again; it feeds because the wound of its abandonment never closes. Cults of the dreadblood gather beneath it, opening their own veins to keep it sated and obedient, and in return it rises over their battle-lines like a banner of slaughter. Salt the threshold, bury your dead with honor and coin upon the eyes, and burn the gore-mound from which it roots. A herald that finds no fresh blood within seven nights sinks back into the red mire from which it was raised, until the next foolish congregation calls it up.
Run Dreadbloods Heralds in Sixty Seconds
- Hold high. Start the herald flying 30+ ft. up and out of reach; make the party answer the air before it ever lands.
- Open with Dread Presence. The DC 17 Wis save on first approach can frighten a PC into wasting a turn before blood is even drawn.
- Kill-priority is the wounded. Blood Frenzy gives advantage on anyone below max HP, and every drop of necrotic/piercing damage near it heals it 10 via Sanguine Hunger, so it snowballs on a hurt party.
- When bloodied, stop trading and start draining: spend Drain on the lowest-HP target each round and Wing Buffet to scatter the line, healing itself back above the threshold.
- Three ways to run it: a winged terror-skirmisher diving and retreating (lean on fly + Rise on the Reek); a grinding lifedrain boss that refuses to die (Drain + Sanguine Hunger loop); or a battle-banner over its cultist heralds (keep minions alive, feed off their deaths).
Dreadbloods Heralds
Huge undead, chaotic evil
CR 12 · 8,400 XP · GUIDELINEBlood Frenzy. The herald has advantage on melee attack rolls against any creature that does not have all its hit points.
Sanguine Hunger. Signature. Whenever the herald reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, or whenever a creature within 10 feet of it takes necrotic or piercing damage from any source, the herald regains 10 hit points and its wings flare with fresh gore.
Dread Presence. The first time a creature ends its turn within 20 feet of the herald, it must succeed on a DC 17 Wisdom save or be frightened until the end of its next turn.
Actions
Multiattack. The herald makes one Beak attack and two Claw attacks.
Beak. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 18 (3d8+6) piercing damage plus 9 (2d8) necrotic damage, and the herald regains hit points equal to the necrotic damage dealt.
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d6+6) slashing damage, and the target's hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the damage taken until it finishes a long rest.
Bonus Actions & Reactions
Crimson Recoil. Reaction. When a creature the herald can see within 60 feet casts a spell or moves out of its reach, the herald sweeps a barbed wing at it. The triggering creature must make a DC 17 Dexterity save, taking 14 (4d6) slashing damage on a failure, or half as much on a success.
Legendary Actions (3/Round)
Wing Buffet. The herald beats its wings. Each creature within 10 feet must succeed on a DC 17 Strength save or be pushed 10 feet and knocked prone.
Drain (Costs 2 Actions). The herald makes one Beak attack and regains hit points equal to the total damage dealt.
Rise on the Reek. The herald flies up to half its fly speed without provoking opportunity attacks, then makes one Claw attack.
A Huge skull-faced horror of dried, layered gore looms on barbed bat-wings above a mound of skulls, its exposed ribcage cradling a still-beating clot of blood. Six lesser heralds in plated armor stand sentinel, spears and bladed standards raised in worship.
Dreadbloods Heralds, Bound
Companion · acts on your initiative
Bound · GUIDELINEWardens of the Reek (signature). While the herald has at least one allied Dreadblood Cultist within 30 feet, it gains advantage on saving throws and its Beak attack deals an extra 4 (1d8) necrotic damage.
Actions
Beak. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (3d6+5) piercing damage plus 7 (2d6) necrotic damage, and the herald regains hit points equal to the necrotic damage dealt.
Reactions
Feed the Banner. When an allied creature within 30 feet is reduced to 0 hit points, the herald regains 10 hit points and may immediately fly up to 20 feet.
Bound by a cult's standing offering, the herald hovers above the party's line as a living banner, draining the fallen of both sides to keep its wings aloft.
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 Dread Presence on approach so a frightened PC wastes its first turn, then flap into the cluster and Wing Buffet to knock the front line prone. Kill-priority is anyone already bloodied, since Blood Frenzy gives advantage; let it heal off Beak hits rather than chasing fresh targets. Pair it with two cultist heralds so the lifedrain loop keeps it standing.
Lead with a Beak strike on the lowest-HP target to trigger Sanguine Hunger healing, then use legendary Wing Buffet at the end of a turn to prone clustered melee. Crimson Recoil punishes the party caster every time they cast or reposition, so steer it toward the back line. Run it with a screen of armored heralds so it stays out of focus-fire until it has fed.
Open in the air, Dread Presence on first contact, then dive: Multiattack the most wounded PC, spend Drain to claw back the health, and end each round with Wing Buffet to keep the front line prone and clustered. Kill-priority is the healer, hunted via Rise on the Reek and Crimson Recoil so spellcasting and movement both bleed. With its lair of cultist heralds bleeding themselves to feed it, the action-economy kit lets a single herald threaten a full party; without that congregation, lean on legendary actions and the heal loop to outlast burst damage.
Put Dreadbloods Heralds 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 Dreadbloods Heralds?
The winged herald is built as a CR 12 (8,400 XP) Huge undead boss at its native Tier 3 (levels 11-15). Drop-in stat lines for Tier 1 (levels 1-4) and Tier 2 (levels 5-10) are provided so you can field the same creature against lower-level parties without rebuilding it.
Can Dreadbloods Heralds be a companion or ally?
Yes. The 'Sanguine Herald, Bound' companion block (AC 17, 110 HP) models a cult-bound herald that hovers over the party's line as a living banner, draining the fallen of both sides; it grows stronger while allied cultists stand near it and heals when an ally drops.
Is the herald solo-capable, or does it need its retinue?
It is a genuine solo centerpiece: three legendary action options plus the Crimson Recoil reaction give it enough extra turns to out-pace a four-PC party. The six lesser heralds in the set make excellent supporting minions, and feeding off their deaths via Sanguine Hunger only makes the boss harder to put down.
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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