What’s a DM to do? As always, we take out the one tool every DM should know how to use, more useful than duct tape, a dremel, a swiss army knife and a leatherman combined: theft.

In this case, we’re stealing from video games. A common staple in video games is the large, multi-part boss fight that changes periodically throughout.

Let me give you an example. I’m coming up to the climactic ending of my campaign. The big bad in question is actually rather small; a halfling-sized warforged named Judgment who is (quite successfully) summoning an entity from the far realms to devour the world.

Now, there are three obvious ways to turn him into the big bad.

1. 1. Make him a solo lurker and hope I can craft the terrain such that it’s an interesting fight. Not bloody likely.
2. 2. Turn him into a hulking monstrosity “because of the far realms taint.” Not terribly desirable, since it radically changes the concept of the character.
3. 3. Make him an elite and surround him with a a more standard encounter. Yawn.

No, no, no. That just won’t do. You see, it’s important to me that the PCs get to fight Judgment as… Judgment. Without getting into detail, suffice to say that a couple of the PCs have a specific and personal (to the players even more so than the characters) vendetta against Judgment as he is.

I also want to make sure that the fight is different and interesting. And so I brainstormed, and here’s what I’ve come up with.

The fight starts off fairly normal. Judgment is just a plain old lurker, not even elite, with a couple warforged and illithids and maybe an umberhulk. When Judgment is destroyed, he shatters into dozens of shards. Hooray, they got to kill the real Judgment!

After the last of the enemies are defeated, however, and before the PCs can take a rest, the shards begin to regenerate into a small army of Judgments. In this form, Judgment is represented as a couple dozen minions, with the nasty ability that every round any one of the minions can deliver a very powerful attack.

Finally, after they defeat the split Judgment, all the pieces coalesce back together into a more abstract, crystalline form. This is Judgment’s final form, and his most difficult. He is now an elite controller who radically alters the way the battles go, drastically reducing healing, making PCs attack each other, and only being hit by rolling under his defense.

I hope this post has inspired you. Provided below are Judgment’s stats in each form.

Actually, as I write this addendum (which technically isn’t an addendum since as far as you’re concerned this all went live at the same time), I’ve just finished this fight. It worked out really well, minus some design issues with the last form of Judgment. The PCs were actually rolling too reliably and having a hard time missing him, and on top of that the basic attack thing wasn’t doing much damage. Turned it into a bit of a slog, so after a few rounds I decided to just end it there.

Other than that, though, I think the multi-part boss idea worked beautifully.

When mortal artificers designed the first creation forge, it was heralded as a triumph of magical ingenuity. For the first time, sentient beings could be created wholesale from inert materials.

Among the first of the warforged created, some even say the first, was a particularly shrewd one known as Tensyk. Tensyk pleased his masters, but secretly worked behind their backs to establish his own creation forge. Tensyk took control of his parentforge using his own homegrown soldiers as well as forgebrothers whom he’d convinced to defect with him.

After taking control of the first forge, he turned on his forgebrothers, slaughtering them. Tensyk then altered the original forge to be more like his own creation, ensuring that he would be the only warforged imbued with free will.

Tensyk began a campaign of conquest, establishing new forges frequently so that his unliving army swelled exponentially. Before long, no mortal civilization remained. Formerly great cities and castles crumbled into ruins, immense tombstones for dead kingdoms.

Warforged outnumber mortals by dozens if not hundreds to one, and each warforged is easily a match for several humans, elves or dwarves. Thrae is a world slowly dying.

The few survivors exist in meager numbers, fighting a guerrilla war not even to retake their former lands but for simple survival. Food, water and shelter are all scarce and fiercely contested; sometimes the warforged are not your most immediate enemy, but your best friend.

Artwork is of the Arcbound Fiend from Magic: the Gathering, and belongs to Wizards of the Coast

Alton Murdoch and Fuller were soldiers in the Cormean army whose unit had been all but destroyed. Stranded deep behind enemy lines, the two were the only ones left, and had vital information. It took all their talent and ability, but they eventually managed to make it back to friendly territory, only to be ambushed as they were escorted to the capitol.

Alton prefers not to talk much about exactly how it happened, saying only that some “peculiar circumstances” allowed his life to be saved by being transplanted into Fuller. In thanks for making the sacrifice, Alton adopted Fuller’s name as his own. Fuller and Alton share control of the body equally.

After debriefing, they were judged no longer fit for duty and honorably discharged. With nowhere of his own to go, Fuller did not resist when Alton wanted to return to Kettlebrook.

It was slow and hard at first to win people over, even Alton’s family, but over the years Fuller’s become fully integrated into the small town. The tireless and resilient warforged body is excellent for working fields and performing other farm work, and every evening they entertain the local children with stories or war and heroics.

Encounters with the Warforged Lifeboat

Given the sleepy agrarian community he resides in, both Fuller’s race and his combat prowess should prove quite a surprise. Depending on the circumstances, he could be friend or enemy to the PCs.

Fuller seeks help from the PCs, as he worries about Alton. Lately he’s felt as if Alton’s grip is loosening, and fears that he might be fading away. The reverse could be intriguing as well, Alton worried that he’s fully supplanting Fuller and not wanting his old friend to fade away.

When its terrible hunger wells up, Unicron reaches out to the worlds of the mortals. It cannot go there directly, but it can play in the dreaming minds of the insane. There it delivers unto them terrible inspirations to create a type of artificial life, a being known as a starforged. The starforged, in turn, act as agents of Unicron and work in secret to summon him, to feed upon the world.

It so happens that on this world, there was a man the legends call Shaynis. Shaynis was an artificer of the greatest caliber, and none since have ever matched his ability. None could have suspected, though, that Shaynis got his inspiration from his dreams, from Unicron.

Shaynis was no fool, however, and saw Unicron’s plan. He used the knowledge that had been gifted upon him to create another line of beings, like the starforged, but in these he imbued the eternal light of goodness. He dubbed them the lifeforged, and set them to their task of preventing Unicron’s summoning.

The first and greatest of the lifeforged was known as Primus, and he lead the rest in battle against their kin. Collectively, the lifeforged and chaosforged were known as warforged, for they were forever fated to be locked in bitter war with one another. The lifeforged fought a losing battle, though, and were forced to the edge of extinction.

As the starforged prepared to summon Unicron, Primus rallied the few remaining lifeforged to stage a final, desperate attack. All seemed lost, but things are not always as they seem.

The great dragon god Bahamut had been following the plight of the lifeforged, and saw that they were a noble people fighting a selfless fight. In the darkest hour, when only Primus remained, Bahamut intervened. He transferred a bit of his divine essence into Primus, elevating Primus to the status of a god.

Even so, the battle was hard-fought, for Unicron had already begun to enter our world. Primus only barely managed to banish Unicron back to its foul home, and used the remaining bit of his power to destroy the spark of life animating the starforged. Spent, Primus faded away from the realm of mortals, to the realm of the gods.

In time, new artificers would find the inert warforged, star- and lifeforged alike, and learned to create new ones. Most of these new warforged worship Primus, but a few have rediscovered and reclaimed the banner of Unicron, which they believe to be their true father.

The mantles of starforged and lifeforged are a thing of the past, though, for modern warforged are all physically the same. Some choose to go by the old names, but most don’t even know of the names, never mind their significance.

A male-personality warforged named Hammer is the leader of the troop, and his standing orders were to defend Cyre and eliminate Karrnathi troops. As such, the warforged are all friendly to Cyran characters, hostile to Karrnathis, and neutral to all others. However, due to the constantly shifting nature of alliances in the Last War, it is not especially difficult to convince Hammer that Karrnathis are no longer his enemy. That said, he is wary of characters who display signs of Karrnathi heritage or speak with a Karrnathi accent. He will not order an attack unless the character appears to be a Karrnathi soldier or the PCs attack the warforged first. Hammer and his men might be convinced to follow the PCs, particularly if there is a Cyran among them.

Complication: One of the warforged, Fracture, has grown slightly insane over the years. He is now fanatically devoted to the defense of Cyre, and considers any non-Cyran an enemy. He will follow Hammer’s orders up to a point, but if Hammer allies with any non-Cyrans (even if there are Cyrans among the group), Fracture will break rank, declare that Hammer is “malfunctioning,” and attempt to lead the other warforged in a mutiny against Hammer and the PCs.