The Most Powerful CR 1 Monsters in D&D

Рет қаралды 56,365

Күн бұрын

Challenge 1 monsters are so far from things like ancient dragons, liches, and the tarrasque, and yet, in their own way, they can pose tremendous threats, especially to low-level characters. In this video, we look at dnd creatures that are stronger than their CR 1 ratings would lead you to believe.
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#dndmonster #dungeonsanddragons #dndranking
Chapters
0:00 CR 1 Monsters
1:41 Ghoul
3:10 Vargouille
5:29 Giant Spider
6:29 Scarecrow
8:11 Giant Octopus
9:27 Alseid
10:44 Meazel
12:57 Vistana Spy
15:05 Kobold Scale Sorcerer
16:23 Quickling
18:12 Copper Dragon Wyrmling
20:32 Outro

Пікірлер: 157

@DrLipkin 5 ай бұрын

A Scarecrow, Animated Armor, and Lion each have a CR of 1. Just in case you wanted to have a Wizard of Oz themed encounter.

@lamentedharp 5 ай бұрын

Good idea! Imagine running an encounter where those three constantly revive until the party gives each of them their heart, brain, and "courage". Maybe courage is something like leaping into the lion's mouth.

@JamesTheKoopaTroopa 5 ай бұрын

Consider your idea stolen...I mean borrowed.

@An_Ian 5 ай бұрын

@@JamesTheKoopaTroopa Same thing really

@ravageMK2 5 ай бұрын

There's a rpg on the Nintendo DS that does that as part of a boss fight actually. Even has a Dorothy to lead them as a 4 enemy fight, though this one is a bomb happy thief more so then a lost girl :P

@ursadabear2810 5 ай бұрын

Grazie mille, Doctor! This knowledge will be used posthaste.

@Zach0451 5 ай бұрын

The level 1 murder hobo in your playgroup is truly the best CR1 monster, they allow for the DM to really express their better nature

@purplehaze2358 5 ай бұрын

To be fair, it's kind of unsurprising how strong giant octopi are considering regular-sized octopi in real life are strong enough to restrain a shark.

@ObscureGaruda 5 ай бұрын

I doubt that’s true

@purplehaze2358 5 ай бұрын

@@ObscureGaruda It is lol

@ObscureGaruda 5 ай бұрын

@@purplehaze2358 100% false

@purplehaze2358 5 ай бұрын

@@ObscureGaruda Don't know what to tell you other than "lol no".

@ObscureGaruda 5 ай бұрын

@@purplehaze2358 If you don’t know what to tell me, then it’s probably better that you don’t tell me anything.

@bigblue344 5 ай бұрын

The biggest issue with balancing isn't how much HP a monster has or how hard it hits, its the fact that they can change the game state completely either through ailments or unique mechanics. Because a unique mechanic has no strict way of calculating how deadly it is and if its paired with a weak monster stat wise you run into problems.

@franohmsford7548 3 ай бұрын

A 36hp monster should not be CR1 full stop! A monster with average damage per attack equal to the Level 1 Barbarian's max HP is going to one-shot your Level 1 characters in short-order and even if it just one-shots one out of the four before it gets taken down that's rather unfair to have a guy who's just rolled up his character have to re-roll on the first encounter through sheer bad luck! We're not talking about high level characters here....We're talking about Level 1! At Level 10 HP isn't as big an issue on either side no but at level 1 it is!

@off6848 2 ай бұрын

A thematic cr 1 monster gets plot armor let’s be real here

@Blakobness 5 ай бұрын

The Giant Octopus can be a bit of a troll with it's tentacle and grab combo and bonus action dash. If the Octopus grabs a player, you can basically decide that the party never sees that character ever again. Moving 60ft as a bonus action in water, 120ft movement total while still having an action to attack and grapple a player if they succeed in getting free, it's just impossible for PCs to compete with that for quite some time. The Octopus doesn't even need to do damage at that point, the PC will just drown if it just gets a couple of turns swimming away at full speed.

@jeffreylucier5266 5 ай бұрын

Thanks for doing what you do for us!

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

Thank you for watching!

@Zthewise 5 ай бұрын

The Meazel fight in the shadow cursed area in BG3 was super obnoxious. Grabbing people and teleporting them out of the safety of torch light.

@genghiskhan6809 5 ай бұрын

That fight and the fight against the mud mephits traumatized me.

@EdwardMichael3 3 ай бұрын

Sleet storm had the Meazels slipping and sliding everywhere. Trivialized the encounter

@coreycoffell6219 2 ай бұрын

Good minions to keep on ones person.

@VideoClam 2 ай бұрын

Esper the Bard is by far the best D&D channel on KZfaq. His videos cover interesting topics, raise compelling questions & are presented in a straight forward manner. No opinionated bloviating, just straight to the point.

@yoh1914 5 ай бұрын

Had an encounter that should have TPK'd the party. We were 3rd level or so, and it was up against 6 Quicklings and a Dryad. Needless to say, we got stomped by round 2. I think the DM realized his screw up, and had us just go unconscious instead.

@Saryn776 3 ай бұрын

Maybe the DM thought the Quicklings were normal Halflings with a cool name.

@namedjasonc 5 ай бұрын

That's Ghoul's 2D6+2 Bite will usually one-shot a Level 1 Sorcerer or Wizard, and has a 41% chance of one-shotting any of the D8 hit-die classes. The Ghoul's paralysis only matters for characters who take more than 2 hits to kill (where that second hit becoming an auto-crit factors in). Unfortunately, since the bite averages 9 damage, none of the classes would take more than 2 average bites to kill (unless the Barbarian is Raging). That said, the sub-optimal paralysis tactic is a good way to make the Ghouls scarier for 1st level characters while technically decreasing the odds of a TPK. Of course, the stuff at the end of your list is insane to consider CR1.

@Tuxon86 5 ай бұрын

The vargouile name is pronounced like gargoyle but with a V instead of a G. The French name of a gargoyle is gargouille, so the vargouille in English would be pronounced as vargoyle.

@ConstantChaos1 5 ай бұрын

Thank you

@LegendStormcrow 5 ай бұрын

Thanks. Thinking about using it.

@apokatastasian2831 5 ай бұрын

except french people don't say gar-goil...they are going to pronounce it gar-goo-wee and var-goo-wee in a way it makes sense to use the same english bastardization, but also vargooey

@ConstantChaos1 5 ай бұрын

@apokatastasian2831 just because it is if French origin doesn't mean it's pronounced exactly like it was French lmfao.... And I've never heard anyone pronounce it anything like that despite knowing native French speakers from Canadian to Creole to Champagne, having been a culinary student and military kid

@apokatastasian2831 5 ай бұрын

@@ConstantChaos1 why not? the dude who made it up, spelled it in a distinctly french fashion. why assume he intentionally chose to spell it Vargouile instead of Vargoyle and then also meant it to not sound french at all...thats an odd assumption to make but whatever, who really cares, it's worth adding that: var gweel, and var goil are both bastardizations so they are both as valid. so how does OP know the correct way to say it...makes no sense I just thought OP pedantically gatekeeping some made up shit without mentioning the actual french is funny

@Klaital1 5 ай бұрын

If you would count the quicklings CR with the monster cr calculator in the DMG, it would come up as around CR 3.

@Wlerin7 5 ай бұрын

Probably closer to CR 2-ish. The problem is the DMG calculations don't take little things like 120 foot movement speed or all attack rolls against it having disadvantage into account, so the "Defensive CR" is only 1/4. But then Offensive CR is 4.

@tomjjackson21 5 ай бұрын

I know this is strange, but I have no friends so I don't play D&D, though I love the lore, and I binge watch your content when I'm busy working or trying to fall asleep. It's been a late night (I'm in Tokyo) and I just started cruising your playlist to fall asleep to, and noticed you uploaded a new video. Please make more 1hr plus videos. Also, is it strange I fall asleep listing to another man talk about a board game?

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

I'm glad you're enjoying my vids, and believe it or not, multiple people have mentioned the same thing about listening to my content while relaxing/falling asleep. I have considered making a longer video with a more calm tone. It would be interesting to experiment with.

@jay_caspian2050 5 ай бұрын

Love the ranking videos, Esper. Your prose are amazing.

@Mikami_The_Bard 5 ай бұрын

*Notes for my new campaign* Those batheads (sorry its my HEADcannon name) are GREAT! Thank you

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

They sure are! Actually, the first D&D monsters I remember ever seeing were kobold, carrion crawler, and vargouille. They all made quite an impression on me.

@TheKrucifix12 4 ай бұрын

I had set up a fey forest encounter where 3 quicklings and a panther killed a level 3 party of 5 people

@ABPAK1 5 ай бұрын

nice to see you a making videos keep it up. can you pls make more 5 backgrounds for (class)

@hypersonicblabla 5 ай бұрын

thanks man i enjoyed the video

@zizzmain6782 4 ай бұрын

I put a party of 3 level six characters up against a few quicklings. it was suppose to be an easy first encounter in a dungeon but they knocked out of of the players.

@user-om1pp5qe5z 5 ай бұрын

Cheers for introducing me to some new creatures

@rachdarastrix5251 5 ай бұрын

I can guarantee you that yes my children challenge what exactly a CR-1 encounter even is.

@abelsampaio389 Ай бұрын

Waiting for the next CR ratings!

@gfhjkfghj4208 5 ай бұрын

Happy new year!

@LuxuriaU 5 ай бұрын

Curious if you ever thought of going back and covering older editions? I started in 5th, but recently (about a year ago) moved over to 3.5 and found it to be a MUCH richer experience, for me and my players at least. 5th Edition if fine, but that's also its problem a lot of the time. It's terminally fine. Of course if anyone inevitably takes offence at that statement, this is all my opinion, you are free to have yours, and neither will I disagree with how you have your fun. But I digress. You also seem to enjoy older editions, with how often you make mention of them, and as I know it you got your start in 3E, and while I don't in anyway think you should focus on it, I'm sure the audience for that type of content is meager at best, it would be fun to see some monster rankings 3rd edition - errrr- edition.

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

Yes indeed I played and GM'd a ton of 3e, then a ton of 4e, then a ton of 5e. There are aspects of 3e that I dearly miss, but overall I find 5e to be a better experience. That said, I do use some house rules in 5e to make things grittier, and my GM style flavors things in its own way. I have done some videos regarding 3e monsters, but not a ton. At some point, I might do a video comparing a monster between its iterations in 3e, 4e, and 5e.

@LuxuriaU 5 ай бұрын

That would be a fun video, there are tons of monsters that went through a lot of changes, good, bad, and middling. Would be fun to see that. Nonetheless, despite not enjoying 5E at my table anymore, always fun to watch your videos that cover it. Cheers.

@Sorain1 5 ай бұрын

@@esperthebard That sounds like a fun video to watch, hope it's as fun to research as it sounds. (I mean, if you enjoy the research process.)

@archersfriend5900 5 ай бұрын

Check out the channel The Joy of Wargaming. He has good content on AD&D.

@ConstantChaos1 5 ай бұрын

I agree on 3.5 being fuller

@purplehaze2358 5 ай бұрын

The logical endpoint to this video would be "The Least Powerful CR 30 Monsters in D&D".

@mrmars4939 5 ай бұрын

LMAO Aren’t there like, 3 cr 30 monsters total?

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

It's the tarrasque ... while in its decades-long slumber

@LuxuriaU 5 ай бұрын

@@esperthebardor when facing a PC with a flying speed.

@Mare_Man 5 ай бұрын

Nothing stops it from jumping @@LuxuriaU

@Ishlacorrin 5 ай бұрын

@@Mare_Man Of knocking the flying target out of the sky with a thrown boulder.

@matheuspm1311 5 ай бұрын

Hey Esper! Could you provide me with anything related to an old module of yours: escape from the scarlet citadel ? Your aberration video got me quite curious! Love your work and thank you for the great videos!

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

Ah ... Escape from the Crimson Citadel, alas that was from before I kept my adventure notes digitally, so I only have my memories of that one. Who knows, maybe someday I'll remake it and publish it.

@USAltefore 4 ай бұрын

My warlock failed the save against the Vistana curse and was blinded. Fortunately, the other party members kept him alive while we continued our quest. In one encounter, a party member used his action to help my warlock aim his Eldritch Blast. Was it the mathematically optimal use of an action. No. Was it worth it? Absolutely!

@Kaiyanwang82 2 ай бұрын

Vargouilles are consistently scary. 3e ones were also no joke. Stunning shriek, curse, and poison on top of that. CR2 tho, which seems to me more appropriate.

@squashedeyeball 5 ай бұрын

A perfect quote for this topic :) Yes, when your party is wiped out, 5 hours into a campaign, you know that things were excessive.

@SpacedOwls 5 ай бұрын

I love that in BG3, the Meazel also causes Silence due to the PC being garroted xD

@oldmanshinji9662 2 ай бұрын

Measles roughed us good in act 2, small but deadly.

@ewokrothaar8434 5 ай бұрын

Impressive. Very nice.

@jeffagain7516 Ай бұрын

Thanks so very much once again, Esper. It's so sad that WOTC has nerf-bat most poison in the game so hard. Either everyone is immune/resistant to it, or it's now pathetically weak even if it does hit. Whatever... Anyway, love the focus on the low-level mobs for encounters., it can be real tricky for a DM to craft intro level beasties that won't intimidate new players. These certainly help. I feel level-2 beasties would benefit from so exploiting as well, since it can be by next session some PCs have leveled at this stage, so DMs need to be quick on their feet this early. Thanks again dear Sir. :)

@overgearedd 5 ай бұрын

Another amazing video, thank you Esper. But I would like to know what creature this 18:04 is?

@MrSilvanous 5 ай бұрын

That's just another version/photo of the quickling

@DrgnDrake 5 ай бұрын

During the Vistana Spy you say they can use Cunning Action to "dash, disengage, or dodge" but I think you meant hide not dodge.

@migueldelmazo5244 5 ай бұрын

Deadliest low CR encounter? Anything involving water. You want to challenge players? Give them a river to cross.

@etienne8110 5 ай бұрын

Roll for dex to not slip on the slippery stones. Oh, you fell. 60ft away from you, a giant octopus reacts 😅

@Thornspyre81 5 ай бұрын

After many years of using "potentially" devastating baddies as a DM, 3 weeks ago a Player's character in our group succumbed to an Intellect Devourer.

@pilkkimies 5 ай бұрын

If you do this with other Crs, this will be interesting!

@thegossamerbox2999 5 ай бұрын

As someone who has played some of BG3 ((still on first play through)), Meazels are the worst. My friend and I first encountered them at level 5 ((lower than the game suggested by the way)), and we died. We all got separated, couldn’t get back to each other, and a more dangerous enemy was attracted when we finally started defeating them. Because of course, we had the misfortune of being teleported too close. Regardless, love the game, loved the video too. Keep up the great work!

@cyricmoonblade 4 ай бұрын

I had a Kitsune player that got the Vargouille curse and... she did not handle it well lol I had to make some divine gm intervention cus they were nowhere near a way to fix the issue in time.

@hellfire66683 4 ай бұрын

Those damn "rats" in the tavern

@vincentthought6130 4 ай бұрын

What dose a +3 to hit mean? Dose it mean you need to roll 3 or higher to hit them or is that the number they need to hit you?

@tysondennis1016 Ай бұрын

I'm sure the quickling is considered evil based on the fact that a fight with it just feels unfair.

@mholt76 5 ай бұрын

No dragon should be a CR1, that's just an insult to dragons.

@redfaux74 5 ай бұрын

I think 5E has completely destroyed the concept of dragons. They are just big lizards with a few extra attacks now. I used to play the Original DnD, Advanced and 2E. They were far better. I hear so many people complain about 5E and how pointless it is.

@balthezaar100 5 ай бұрын

Original post was obviously made by a dragon. Lol.

@off6848 2 ай бұрын

@@redfaux74yeah I think it’s our cultural attitudes towards dragons though that’s what it’s reflecting. The post-pokemonization world

@supersmily5811 4 ай бұрын

Vargouilles are the Flood. They overrun planes they are given even a tiny amount of wiggle room in. Think about it, a Commoner has +0 Charisma saves and 10 Charisma. Commoner gets cursed, dies, and at most 8 hours later a new Vargouille's joined the server. In the meantime, the original one has 8 hours to keep going to new Commoners and repeating the process. If we GENEROUSLY assume it gets maybe 5 people before some town guard or something kills it, that problem will exponentially increase in difficulty.

@off6848 2 ай бұрын

More like mosquitoes technically our worst enemies on regular earth. All towns would’ve developed counter measures to those pests

@TYOjoe 5 ай бұрын

im starting my players level 1 underwater. Should the first fight be a giant octopus?

@Rogue0DK 4 ай бұрын

Which encounter generator is that ?

@SonySteals 5 ай бұрын

Meazels being CR1 break my mind…

@raytheerudite5252 5 ай бұрын

Just got my boss for level 1 dungeon.

@rachdarastrix5251 5 ай бұрын

Really? Who did you pick?

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

The copper wyrmling? Here's a cool thing you can put in the dungeon, have a treasure vault or other "side chamber" that is not necessary to make it through the dungeon. It's a totally option room and has a really difficult challenge to access (crypt riddle, high DC skill tests, deadly monster guardian, etc.), but if the characters can manage to access it, they discover some great treasure, including some kind of acid resistance magic item, like acid resistance armor or potion(s). This then would help them survive the encounter with the acid-breathing wyrmling.

@raytheerudite5252 5 ай бұрын

@@rachdarastrix5251 Dragon Wyrmling of course. It brings back memories of playing starter box D&D games after Christmas with my family as a kid.

@rachdarastrix5251 5 ай бұрын

@@esperthebard Parents: "Why did you make a game of giving them a way to resist your acid?" Wyrmling: "It was suppose to go to a worthy companion, wasn't expecting a home intruder to answer the riddle dishonestly."

@rachdarastrix5251 5 ай бұрын

@@raytheerudite5252 A game playing kid on Christmas? You already have the perfect personality for this character.

@TheSlashmaster101 5 ай бұрын

I think we need a beast tier list. Don't want to exclude an entire enemy type, even if they ARE rather simple in action economy

@kamikeserpentail3778 5 ай бұрын

If done well a good session could be designed around any of them. I still hope to some day throw a group of level 1s against a Displacer Beast, in a very indirect manner.

@jordanritchey5526 4 ай бұрын

I imagine the meazel encounter in BG3 has ended the run for a lot of first time players in honor mode 😂

@caesarmedina8489 5 ай бұрын

Anything out of The Book of Vile Darkness. I know its from 3.5, but still, I hate everything in there. There was a race in there called Kython's, that had blindsignt, resist 20 (fire,elect)and immunities, (acid, ice) multiple attacks, poison that consisted of a initial and a secondary hits to your stats. CR 1 and 3, 1d6 to Con, CR 5 and 8, 1d6 to Str, CR 11 and 13, 2d6 to Str. We had to fight them throughout the campaign. The CR 1 had 11HP, 18 AC, multi atk for 2d6+1 and 1d4, each atk had a chance to poison you DC12 for 1d6 Con. So while only 9 (avg) damage and possibly 6(avg) Con, that was very very long lasting(back then). So they didn't out right kill you, they swarm and nerfed you with each encounter. Also, 0 Con= death. No healing can help you.

@michaelclark6941 5 ай бұрын

Meazels OP af. Teleport to a ledge and drop the enemy from it.

@beanspud88 5 ай бұрын

Fire snakes are a evil lil cr 1 creature. Resistance to no magical weapons, fire damage on being hit in melee and 2x attacks with fire damage.

@esperthebard 5 ай бұрын

Ooh good call, fire snakes totally could have made this list.

@HeavensTaint 5 ай бұрын

I always thought Vargouille was pronounced similar to Gargoyle.

@Lakefront_Khan 5 ай бұрын

Have a Quickling familiar sounds baller.

@brunohommerding3416 5 ай бұрын

i cant see how NOT to completely destroy a low lvl party with a quickling, if i DM them and just use lets say 2 of them, the players will die, its simple as that. Unless i deliberately choose not to play them smart, something that would make it weird since they are not supposed to be stupid. Its one of those monsters that if you DM them as they should be, you feel unfair towards your players

@jobgeerdes8794 5 ай бұрын

I once as a protest paired 8 quicklings up with a NPC level 9 twilight cleric/level 6 shepherd druid to face off vs 5 level 10 characters. It was a one sided land slide, but not for the players. They had to plead for a ceasefire and promised not to interfere in the affairs of the forest. According to Kobold fight club this would be an easy encounter

@kamikeserpentail3778 5 ай бұрын

Easy really. Let the party hear about them ahead of time so they can scooby doo some traps, or stumble upon the quicklings as they're distracted decimating a different low level adventuring party.

@koljaleffek7290 4 ай бұрын

a great reminder for dms to use their judgement instead of trusting the numbers in the official books😅

@mattnerdy7236 5 ай бұрын

Hey Esper, I'm your 69 comment, Giggity! 🎉 Happy New Year 🎊 Great video, can't wait to use a copper dragon wyrmling as a pet to a pack of kobolds. Thanks Esper you have a wonderful day!

@etienne8110 5 ай бұрын

Noice

@Flirtz420 5 ай бұрын

💙

@jonumine6250 5 ай бұрын

For the quickling: MAGIC MISSILE GOES BRR. Still dangerous though if its a group of two or more.

@Sorain1 5 ай бұрын

Everything past the Octopus is just... No. That is NOT CR 1, and often for a specific 'why is this allowed?' reason. The Copper Dragon's breath is absolutely at least twice as damaging as it should be, just for an easy example. Quicklings are a flat tool check. Either the party has an answer and succeeds in applying it, or TPK ensues.

@ConstantChaos1 5 ай бұрын

Naw you need some gods in the tier for posterity lol

@effincook4176 5 ай бұрын

kzfaq.info/get/bejne/n5lglZuBrNm6cWQ.html Nono, it's definitely punch

@lorekeeper685 5 ай бұрын

Lvl 1 bard

@PeregrineFallgrove-dl7ub 2 ай бұрын

Nice Metallica quote

@mrosskne 5 ай бұрын

an allip can kill a tarrasque

@that1otherJake 5 ай бұрын

You get a like for the Metallica reference. 😂

@dave-bulletrider 5 ай бұрын

Oh yeah, my "Like" was #666 \m/ :D

@blitz6636 5 ай бұрын

•)

@cahdragon 5 ай бұрын

To whomever created the Quickling...who hurt you?

@franohmsford7548 3 ай бұрын

If these are CR1 monsters then CR is broken! How can a Ghoul be CR1? What CR is a basic Skeleton or Zombie then? And then this list gets progressively more ridiculous :) Any Monster that can literally one-shot a CR 1 Fighter or Barbarian with max hp 50% of the time {I'm not talking about an Orc with a great-axe here but even that would be iffy if you start giving that Orc strength and Proficiency bonuses} should not be considered to be CR1! Any Monster with an average HP total equalling the total HP of a 4 man level one group should not be considered CR1! 36hp is way too much for a CR1 monster!

@franohmsford7548 3 ай бұрын

OK How is a 3rd Level Rogue {Vistana Spy} a CR 1? That's a CR3-4!