In the post Campaign: Rise of the Serpentines, I briefly mentioned that I had created a two-headed snake that I did not get to use because my players were clever enough to skip the mini boss and head straight into the serpents’ nest. This did mean I had spent several hours of map making, stat block creating, and encounter balancing that the players only interacted with long enough to decide to avoid it, but such is the lot of a game master.
I would like to publish the two-headed snake stat block here even though I have never tested it. It was inspired by the Angry GM’s two-headed, two-tailed, bifurcated snake, which you can read about here. Skip to the section heading “A Tale of Two Snakes” for a shorter read.
The sum of the Angry GM post is that you can make a boss monster more powerful and interesting by giving it two pools of hit points, and when one pool is depleted there is a change to their attacks or abilities. In the case of my two-headed snake, when it is dropped to half health one of the heads drops off in a spray of hot blood, and from here forward the snake only has one head with one attack. Half of the monster is defeated, and with the loss of a head the level of danger has decreased, which potentially inspires the characters to bring a swift conclusion to the encounter.
About the Features
Bite is about as standard an action as you can get with a beast-type monster, and the two-headed snake has a bite for each of its heads. Because a successful hit causes the target to be grappled and restrained, the two-headed snake is likely to continue clamping down (snakes do not chew) on the same target each turn because it will have advantage on its attack. As I am writing this, I see a missed opportunity to have a combo Swallow attack. Perhaps another time.
Paralyzing Spit is a a bonus action that gives the two-headed snake a chance to decommission a target via paralysis for up to one minute (though likely less). I would lead with this move, first paralyzing one character then biting two more. The two-headed snake is not very intelligent, so it would not necessarily recognize which delicious snack in front of it would be most susceptible to its venom. As written there is ambiguity on whether the Paralyzing Spit move is available if both mouths are grappling a player character; use your best judgement when making that call.
Dead Weight is the feature I mentioned that kills one head when the two-headed snake is reduced to half HP. It makes the most sense with blade-based attacks, but I see no reason that a well-aimed arrow or an expertly slung spell cannot cinematically blast the head off. It is a game, after all.
Burning Blood is the main reason I am disappointed that I did not get to use this monster. As a player, if I attacked a monster and severed its head, causing acidic blood to spray out upon me, I think that would be very cool. Again, it is less cool if the attack was made at range, but hopefully there is an ally within ten feet who gets to experience the burning blood bath. And yes, I do mean “gets” to.
So, there is the two-headed snake, which will lie in wait in the monster stat block archives, waiting for a chance to rear its two heads. Enjoy, and have fun out there.
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