Monster of the Week #19

This week we look over to an old favourite of mine - Monster Hunter!

GM Binder have a great Monster Hunter Bestiary for 5e which has a huge amount of content that you will recognise as a Monster Hunter fan.

After returning to play Monster Hunter World (after not playing it for around 2 years), I found myself wondering how to home-brew some of these creatures into the game - only to discover the hard work has already been done!

The Lunastra is a blue Elder Dragon in Monster Hunter that has mastery of the fire element, and ice often seen with the Teostra - her red counterpart. Adorning crown-like horns, the Lunastra is a powerful foe in Monster Hunter, and I feel has been very well represented in the Monster Hunter Bestiary, which can be found here.    

This monster is set fro CR 12, and will give your mid level party a run for their money, especially with some of the abilities from Monster Hunter that this version keeps - including some legendary actions to give it extra oomph.

Aside from the standard Multiattack for many larger threats in 5e, the Lunastra has its familiar Fire Aura, Devil's Powder and Fire Breathe, which could be a massive challenge for a party. These abilities allow the Lunastra to control a group through large abilities or by chipping damage to players whenever they get close and hit it.

The Fire Aura deals a D6 damage at the start of the Lunastra's turn, or when they touch the monster. This in combination with Devil's Powder - which requires everyone within a 20 foot radius to do a DC 18 Dex save or take 2d10 fire and 2d10 force damage (half as much on success) - can be pummel the stronger, more aggressive members of a party. For those who prefer distance, the Lunastra can Charge dealing an additional 2d8 damage to an attack if a party member is run down.

In addition to this, the legendary actions (which Lunastra has 3 of) allow it to move without proving, do a standard attack, or do Devil's Blight at the cost of 2 legendary actions. 

Lastly, the Lunastra can do a Fire Breath attack which is a 60 ft cone, Dex 18 save, or deliver 8d8 fire damage (or half as much on a success).

That's some BIG moves - but the creators of this 5e conversion thought about it's weaknesses as well. The Lunastra cannot deliver it's fire aura or fly while it is poisoned - which could save a lot of chip damage to party members and keep the Lunastra on the ground for any capable melee fighters.

That's it for this week - a quick spotlight for our favourite Monster Hunter nemesis. Check out the Bestiary yourself over at GM Binder to see more like this. We'll feature more of these monsters in later weeks as we are big Monster Hunter fans at Kosmic Keepers.

Thanks for reading and good gaming!

-KJ