Converting Devil May Cry 1 Bosses into Dungeons and Dragons 5e monsters

The recent Devil May Cry Anime motivated me to replay all the games. While playing, I decided to convert each of the Bosses and enemies into Dungeons and Dragons Monsters. Today I started with the four bosses that are not Nero Angelo. Phantom, Griffon, and Nightmare. The goal is to make them playable and replicate their game abilities as closely as possible without falling into unplayability due to excessive abilities. 

Phantom 

Phantom is the first boss you encounter in the game. At the end of mission 3: Destroyer of Ardor. For a first boss, he is tough, at least the first time. He is a bus-sized spider-ish demon. Covered in lava that hardens and reflects your sword attacks unless you are in Devil Trigger, which I translated to Immunity to slashing damage from non-Magical weapons. He leaves a lava trail that deals negligible damage, and can also take out a giant scorpion tail to strike at you. All of that, ignoring the fireball he can throw at your face. Overall, an interesting creature. So, let's look at its stats. 

Griffon

Griffon is a large avian monster that appears on Mission 9: New Strength. The demon has control over lightning, which makes my homonim sword not so useful against him. It also uses a lot of area attacks with lightning rays that force you to be on the lookout for them. A lot of the problem when trying to replicate videogame creatures into Dungeons & Dragons monsters is to give them every single ability or combo in their statblock. While flavorful, it makes them unwieldy to use, and you end up using only two or three attacks with them. For Griffon, I gave it Lightning Bombs and Channel Lighting to replicate the area attacks. Griffon can dish out a lot of damage in an area, but can take it back since, at the end, he is just a demonic bird. 

Nightmare 

Nightmare is a large construct made as a weapon of hell. It is a bioweapon, a remnant of when Devil May Cry 1 was initially intended to be Resident Evil 4. The monster first appears in Mission 16: Nightmare of Darkness. Since it is a construct with specific conditions for its lair, it was the most complicated of the four to create. Similar to Griffon, when replicating every single attack into a Dungeons and Dragons Monster Statblock, you run into the issue of having too many abilities. Adding recharge times can make it unwieldy. For Nightmare, the solution came in the form of the Beholder Statblock. Since Nightmare attacks follow a pattern, I replicated them as a table that you roll whenever the Nightmare acts. For separation of gameplay and story reasons, I left the ability to move you to another boss minifight as a trait, so it's optional for your games. I would love to create a cinematic encounter using the Epic Encounters system, which I designed several years ago in a past job. However, I would need more time and some support, as it involves creating maps, alternative win conditions, and specific stat blocks. 

Nero Angelo 

Nero Angelo is Vergil when enslaved by Mundus, using the Black Knight Armor (if you want stats for the Black Knight Armor, please let me know in the comments). As Vergil, he was a fallen devil hunter who used Yamato. Since this article focuses on the bosses in their Devil May Cry 1 iterations, I am basing his attack set on the original game alone. The first thing I wanted to replicate was the use of combos. Most enemies in Dungeons and Dragons use Multiattack to justify several actions vs all the actions of a party. At some point in my life, I developed a system to make boss battles that rely on an action pool for the monsters. While in future iterations I may make use of that ruleset, I want to use the basic one here. Using Multiattack and the option to change the attacks for other actions, I can give Nero Angelo versatility. He can make the full 4 slash combo, dealing 1d6 extra damage on each attack if he hits the same target, or he can change part of those 4 slashes for other options. He can make High Time and then Helm Breaker, or Streak and then High Time, the choice is yours. For the Devil Trigger, I wanted to incorporate some of the game's abilities without requiring extensive tracking. Ultimately, it's just an effect that activates when he takes 30 or more damage in a single round, granting him Advantage and regeneration. 

That would be all for today, hope you enjoy it. Let me know in the comments If I should go for three, four  or five bosses next time. 

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