D&D 5E Giant Insects?

[Pickaxe]

I noticed that giant insects are missing from the MM: no giant ants, giant bees, or giant wasps, specifically. Am I missing something? If not, has anyone constructed 5e versions of these creatures?

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

There is a whole appendix of "miscellaneous creatures" you appear to have missed.

There aren't specifically ants or bees in there, but there are wasps.

I have used the giant wasp stats to be wasps, bees, and even robber flies with no change but my description of them during play, and have run giant ants by using giant scorpion stats and pretending they didn't have their stingers.

 

[Pickaxe]

Actually, I didn't miss the appendix, but I missed the wasps in there, mainly because I was originally looking for giant ants and bees. (And, yes, I did see the centipedes, scorpions, and spiders, but of course they are not insects!) The substitutions make sense, though one reason I wanted stats for social insects is that they have different castes, and I was interested in developing encounters where players might encounter some workers and then need to deal with soldiers. Any suggestions for different ant/bee castes? And I'm also wondering whether these monsters are already statted out somewhere besides MM, given that they are pretty classic D&D monsters.

--Axe

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I liked the giant ant nest and random tables in Quests of Doom Volume II (https://www.froggodgames.com/quests-doom-volume-2-5e), and I liked the giant ant stats too. I can't remember offhand whether Fifth Edition Foes (https://www.froggodgames.com/fifth-edition-foes) has giant ants specifically in it but it definitely has a number of giant insects within its pages, I think between six and twelve total. I'm away from my books right now or I'd look it up for you.

 

[Illithidbix]

Using the "Monsters by Type PDF"
http://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/DnD_MonstersByType_1.0.pdf

Technically not all of these are insects but...

Swarm of insects CR 1/2
Giant centipede CR 1/4
Giant crab CR 1/8
Giant fire beetle CR 0
Giant scorpion CR 3
Giant spider CR 1
Giant wasp CR 1/2
Giant wolf spider CR 1/4

In the back of the Monster Manual.

Giant wasps are quite nasty from my experience.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

The substitutions make sense, though one reason I wanted stats for social insects is that they have different castes, and I was interested in developing encounters where players might encounter some workers and then need to deal with soldiers. Any suggestions for different ant/bee castes?

Depending on how tough you want things to be, either the worker caste as-is with the substitution mentioned and the soldier caste with double HP and +50% damage, or the soldier caste with the substituted stats as-is and the workers with 75% HP and damage.

And I'm also wondering whether these monsters are already statted out somewhere besides MM, given that they are pretty classic D&D monsters.

--Axe

I haven't seen them anywhere yet, but I haven't been looking either.

 

[DM_Jeff]

I liked the giant ant nest and random tables in Quests of Doom Volume II (https://www.froggodgames.com/quests-doom-volume-2-5e), and I liked the giant ant stats too. I can't remember offhand whether Fifth Edition Foes (https://www.froggodgames.com/fifth-edition-foes) has giant ants specifically in it ...

Right, while 5th Edition Foes doesn't have the giant ants specifically they do have a great selection of giant bugs. The giant ant stats in Quests of Doom vol2 were spot on. WotC also had giant ant queen, giant ant worker, and giant ant drone in the D&D Next bestiary if you still have access to that.

 

[Greenstone.Walker]

I liked the giant ant nest and random tables in Quests of Doom Volume II (https://www.froggodgames.com/quests-doom-volume-2-5e), and I liked the giant ant stats too.

Same here. The anthill adventure was a lot of fun to read, and I plan to use the giant ant stats elsewhere in my campaign. I highly recommend the Quests of Doom books.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Here are some bugs I statted up while converting The Goodman Games module The Mysterious Tower to 5E for use in my campaign. Enjoy.

Giant Bombardier Beetle
medium beast, unaligned
Armor Class 15 (natural armor)
Hit Points 40 (5d8+ 5)
Speed 30 ft., climb 30 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
10 (+0) 14 (+2) 12 (+1) 2 (−4) 11 (+0) 3 (−4)
Senses blindsight 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 1 (200XP)
Actions
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: (3d6+2) piercing damage,
Acid Spray. The giant bombardier beetle can spray a 15’ cone of acid. Those in the area must make a DC 14 DEX save or suffer 1d6 acid damage. This damage continues for two more rounds unless neutralized.

Giant Stag Beetle
huge beast, unaligned
Armor Class 18 (natural armor)
Hit Points 195(15d12+45)
Speed 40 ft., climb 30 ft.
STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA
22(+6) 12 (+1) 16 (+3) 2 (−4) 11 (+0) 3 (−4)
Senses blindsight 30 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages —
Challenge 9 (5000 XP)
Actions
Multi-attack: If the giant stag beetle has room to move, it can make a trample and bite attack in the same round.
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: (5d6+6) piercing damage,
Trample If the giant stag beetle can move at least 20 feet it can trample a target that is at least one size smaller than itself. The trample attack is +9 to hit and does 6d6+6 bludgeoning damage. The target must make a DC 16 STR saving throw or be knocked prone.


Characters in this campaign get very generous HP rolls, so the monsters HP get a boost too.