Dev Diary #5: Frost Giants, Martial NPCs, & Monster Cards
Discover the latest Foe Foundry updates including new Frost Giant statblocks, martial NPCs like Knights and Berserkers, and a sneak peek at the upcoming Monster Generator.
Welcome to the 5th Dev Diary for Foe Foundry the free 5E monster generator! I've been busy forging away at a couple new monsters complete with lore, encounters, and adventure hooks that are ready to drop right into your games.
Read this Dev Diary on the Site, where you'll see be able to play around with the statblocks directly.
Martial NPCs: Guards, Warriors, Berserkers, & Knights
Patron Prioritization Poll #5 was a three-way tie between Guards, Warriors, and Berserkers. For fun, I added Knights as well!
There's also a whole article on No More Boring Martial NPCs with lots of details and example statblocks.
Formidable Frost Giants
I've added Frost Giants, frozen reavers of blood and battle. There's also a dedicated article on Forging Formidable Frost Giants that talks about how to take advantage of some pretty unique powers. I'm happy with how these giants came out compared to the bland Monster Manual giants.
Patron Prioritization Poll #7: Constructs
The next Patron Prioritization Poll will focus on Constructs. Which magic-imbued creation do you want to see wrought to life next?
- Animated Armor
- Golems (Stone, Iron, Clay, and Flesh)
- Gorgons
- Shield Guardians
- Simulacrum
Alpha Plan Updates
Monster Cards
I'm happy to report that I've made significant progress on the Monster Generator. I've been able to create the Monster Cards that will be the basis of the editor UI. Here's a quick video showing the card in action. For each monster, you'll see the available powers listed as "loadouts" where you can select the powers from a dropdown, or randomize the whole monster (similar to rolling the dice on the site today). You'll also be able to customize the HP and damage output of the monster.
I still have another week or two of work to hook everything together and make the generator accessible to everyone, but I'm encouraged by the progress I've made of late.
Beta Plans
Once the generator is launched, I will move Foe Foundry from Alpha to Beta.
So far, I'm planning these enhancements during Beta (subject to change and feedback, of course). These features are designed to make homebrewing and managing monsters for your 5E games even easier:
- Search Improvements so you can easily find the monsters you need
- Markdown Export so you can drop any of the generated monsters into Notion, Obsidian, etc.
- PDF Export for folks who prefer a tried and true format
- Foe Foundry Accounts: a login and account system so you can save your monsters
- Encounter Building: automatically create challenge-appropriate and thematic encounters with a fun, swipeable UI
I can’t wait to see what you build with Foe Foundry — and I’d love your feedback as the project grows.
Thanks for reading, and have fun running games for your friends, family, and loved ones!
– Cordialgerm